The iconic TV show Michael Keaton was “too lazy” to star in: “That didn’t interest me”
The early 2000s were undoubtedly the trickiest period Michael Keaton had to endure in a career that started almost 30 years previously, and he knew that better than most.
He’d been a regular presence onscreen throughout the 1980s and 1990s, but he decided to take a step back from Hollywood to focus on spending time with his family. Unfortunately, every actor knows that staying out of sight for too long runs the risk of slipping out of mind, and it was a long road back to relevance.
Keaton went four years without a single feature film appearance, and widely panned titles like the shoddy sports drama A Shot at Glory, saccharine comedy First Daughter, and the dire superantural thriller White Noise didn’t exactly strap a rocket to his back and sent him careening towards his former position as a populer, well-known, and in-demand leading man.
The former Batman’s self-imposed exile coincided with a paradigm shift within the industry, which saw TV shows like The Sopranos, The Wire, and The Shield usher in a new ‘Golden Age’ for episodic storytelling that helped shake the stigma that the small screen was a lesser medium than cinema.
Those series captured imaginations, captivated viewers, and became unmissable water-cooler conversation points, but there was arguably no other show that seized the zeitgeist like Lost. JJ Abrams’ riveting mystery left audiences perplexed, perched on the edge of their seats, and unable to wait a week for the answers they may or may not even get, and it could have starred Keaton if he’d been arsed.
Matthew Fox landed Primetime Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for his ongoing performance as Jack Shephard, the erstwhile lead who was also the first-billed name in the credits. During development, the character was supposed to be killed off at the end of the first episode, which is where Keaton came in.
“He said, ‘Here’s what happens: the guy that you think is the lead dies in the last ten minutes,'” the actor recalled his early meetings with Abrams. “And I thought, ‘Yeah!’ The idea of doing an hour television show, I’m just too lazy. So I thought, ‘Wow, this is pretty good! Then I don’t have to be in the series!”
As Lost drew closer to entering production, though, a decision was made that Shephard wasn’t going to die after all, which instantly killed Keaton’s enthusiasm. “I guess maybe we had a brief conversation where he thought better, or the studio said, ‘That ain’t gonna happen,'” he continued. “And then there was kind of a half-conversation, like, ‘Well, do you have any more interest?’ And that didn’t interest me.”
Keaton was game to appear in the pilot, as long as he didn’t make it to the end credits alive. When the goalposts were shifted and Shephard was refitted into a key recurring character who’d eventually factor into all six seasons, his aversion to committing to a multi-year series immediately soured him on Lost and opened the door for Fox to snag his career-defining role.
