Maureen Ryan’s new book “Burn It Down” releases next week. Ryan, a veteran reporter, film critic and contributing editor to Vanity Fair, wrote the work, which looks into the patterns of harassment and bias baked into the Hollywood system.
An excerpt from the book has now been released over at Vanity Fair, its focus being on ABC’s iconic late 2000s mystery drama series “Lost” which ran for six seasons.
In the book, showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse confront several accusations of racism, a toxic work environment and more that allegedly occurred during the making of the series.
The accusations include claims of racial bias, remarks behind the scenes that allegedly impacted plotlines, and claims regarding the writers’ room conduct.
One writer on the third season dubbed the production as the most “nakedly hostile” working environment she had ever experienced and said she was “discriminated against on the daily”.
Another indicates the staff was repeatedly told that white characters Locke (Terry O’Quinn), Jack (Matthew Fox), Kate (Evangeline Lilly) and Sawyer (Josh Holloway) were the ‘hero characters’ and “nobody cares about these other characters. Just give them a few scenes on another beach.”
Speaking with Ryan in 2021 in response to the claims, Lindelof says:
“My level of fundamental inexperience as a manager and a boss, my role as someone who was supposed to model a climate of creative danger and risk-taking but provide safety and comfort inside of the creative process – I failed in that endeavor.
I was like, OK, as long as there are one or two [writers] who don’t look and think exactly like me, then, then I’m OK. I came to learn that was even worse. For those specific individuals, forget about the ethics or the morality involved around that decision, but just talking about the human effect of being the only woman or the only person of color and how you are treated and othered — I was a part of that, a thousand percent.
The way that I conduct myself and the way that I treat other humans who I am responsible for and a manager of is a by-product of all the mistakes that were made… I have significantly evolved and grown, and it shouldn’t have had to come at the cost and the trauma of people that I hurt on ‘Lost.'”
Running from 2004-2010, the series was a cultural icon and followed the survivors of a plane crash tapped on a tropical island filled with mysterious things going on. Matthew Fox, Evangeline Lilly, Josh Holloway, Naveen Andrews, Dominic Monaghan, Daniel Dae Kim, and Harold Perrineau were among the core cast members.
The full excerpt can be found over at Vanity Fair.
Source: Variety
