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BEACH BOY
MATTHEW FOX, THE STAR OF THIS MONTH’S EMOTIONAL FEATURE FILM WE ARE MARSHALL AND ABC’S HIT SERIES LOST, IS A MAN OF SIMPLE PLEASURES, ALL OF WHICH HE CAN EASILY FIND IN HIS ADOPTED HOME STATE, HAWAII. BY MARK SEAL. PHOTOGRAPH BY PEGGY SIROTA.
On the day of my conversation with Matthew Fox, an earthquake measuring 6.6 on the Richter scale hits the Hawaiian islands. But Fox, at home on Oahu, remains, as always, calm. Calm under pressure has been Fox’s mantra ever since he landed the role of Dr. Jack Shephard, the leader of the survivors on ABC’s hit dramatic/adventure series Lost. This month, he stars in a feature film called We Are Marshall as another strong, heroic, calm-under-pressure type. The film, which costars Matthew McConaughey, is based on a true story about the resurgence of the Marshall University football team after the death of 37 of its players. Next year, Fox will star with Dennis Quaid in Vantage Point, a contemporary action thriller, set in Barcelona, about a kidnapping attempt on the president of the United States.
Fox was born and bred into a life of adventure, albeit a long way from Hawaii. He’s a Wyoming boy, the middle of three cowboy brothers who grew up in the saddle on his family’s longhorn cattle ranch in Crowheart, Wyoming. Fox attended Columbia University and planned to use his economics degree in a career on Wall Street. But he met a modeling agent and was whisked away into that world and then to television and film. He eventually landed a role on Fox’s family drama Party of Five, which made him famous and earned him a spot in People magazine’s 1996 “50 Most Beautiful People in the World” issue.
Almost a decade later, he found even brighter fame on Lost’s mythical and mysterious island. Premiering on September 22, 2004, the show was an immediate hit, and so was Fox, who has regularly earned awards and nominations, including a 2006 Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actor in a Drama. The role came with a major side benefit: Fox, his wife, and their two children had to move to Oahu. He tells me his daughter’s first reaction was emotional. “We were still in California, and I was just telling her that we were going to be moving to Hawaii for at least a year,” he says. “She started crying. I was not sure where that was coming from. I said, ‘Baby, what’s wrong?’ And she said, ‘Daddy, these are tears of happiness. I’m so happy to be going; I’m crying tears of happiness.’ ” Things got even better from there. Here’s the life Matthew Fox and his family found after arriving in Hawaii to get Lost.
How did you discover Oahu? My daughter’s nine, so it would have been about eight years ago. The first time we ever came to Hawaii, we came to Oahu to spend about a week with a couple we had met in Los Angeles. They have been family friends for almost 10 years now. We both had young children at the time, and we just hung out and enjoyed the island. They had some friends here, so they showed us around a bit, and we did some surfing and generally just kind of fell in love with the place. Since then, we have been coming pretty much every year — you know, at least once a year for a vacation. My wife and kids had fallen in love with it so much that we used to sort of joke about what it would be like if I got a job and shot here.
Where did you stay the first time you went there? We stayed at what I think is called the Ihilani now, over on the west side of the island. That was the first place that we ever stayed. It’s a big resort. Very nice. I think that is where all the NFL players stay when they come for the Pro Bowl. It has some man-made lagoons. It’s a little manicured, but it’s beautiful.
What do the kids like to do there? Where do you take them? They spend all their time in the ocean or in the pool. We have both. It’s the first time that we have ever had a pool. And we have the ocean 25 yards in front of the house. They love it. My little boy has just turned five, so he has been here for a couple of years. He actually learned to swim here, and he is just a fish now. He spends lots of time out in the waves by himself; we watch from the beach, but he is really totally fearless and has a ball. My daughter has always been that way about the water. They spend a lot of time outdoors, which is great to see. I really feel great about that.
Where do you start your day? I have my favorite little coffee shop that I go to every day. It’s in Kailua, right next to where I live. It’s a few minutes’ drive from my house, and it’s a family-run joint. It’s called Muddy Waters, which I think is, like, the coolest coffee-shop name. With that name, as you might imagine, they play a ton of blues music, which is great because I’m a big music fan and a big fan of the blues. They constantly are playing great music in there, and they also have live bands that come in on Friday and Saturday nights occasionally and play music outside. It’s a really cool place, and they make great coffee too. I’m sort of a standard-coffee guy. I don’t go for all the really fancy stuff. I’m more for sort of a house brew with cream and sugar, but their coffee is good. There are a bunch of nice people in there. They know me and I know them, so it’s no big deal when I walk in there. Sometimes I take my kids in there, and they get chocolate milk and stuff.
What’s your favorite beach? My favorite beach is the beach that I live on, Kailua Beach. I think it is totally underrated. Lanikai Beach is the beach that gets all the press on the east side. Lanikai Beach is more crowded because it has this massive reputation of being the really hot beach. Kailua Beach never has anybody on it. It’s much wider. You actually get some waves coming in; Lanikai Beach has reefs all across it, so there are never any waves coming in. It has a sandy bottom, so it’s great for the kids.
What are some of your other favorite haunts? I’m a huge fan of Lanikai Juice Bar. They use all fresh fruit, and they just make really incredible, really healthy smoothies and juices. I love it. It’s a family-run thing, and all the people that work there are really cool. It’s a nice place to go to get something for breakfast. We go with the kids to Lanikai Juice quite a bit. They really enjoy that, and that’s always fun. They get geared up for that.
What are your landmarks on Oahu? My favorite place is Kualoa Ranch. We shoot up in there a lot on Lost, actually. I think it’s considered to be sort of a sacred place for the Polynesians. It’s absolutely beautiful. Ka‘a‘awa Valley is just unbelievably pretty. It’s a really big, open valley that you don’t see until you drive right past the mouth of it, and then this incredible valley opens up and goes way back into the island. It’s just really, really beautiful, and it has a really special feel about it.
Can you hike there? Do you drive through it? What do you do there? Well, I’m not quite sure. I’ve always spent my time in there with the production, but I think it’s privately owned by a big ranching family that’s been there for many, many years. I’m not sure about the restrictions on getting in there. But it’s certainly worth it if you can get in. I know you can do tours up in there from that ranch. I see people on horseback all the time, and I see people up there on four-wheelers. So there is definitely somebody taking tours up through there.
Do you like to drive up to the North Shore? I do the North Shore drive all the time. Yeah, it’s a pretty drive. My favorite drive is down around the southeastern part of the island, where the road is winding around all these cliffs. It’s absolutely beautiful. That’s my favorite drive. Any opportunity I get, I make that drive and then stop. There are a lot of turnouts, and you stop and you are up on these cliffs, looking out over the ocean. There are a lot of places where the surf is huge, and it hits these cliffs, and the waves will spray up in the air, like, 40 feet. It’s just really powerful and majestic, open and beautiful.
Okay, where do you eat? Well for sushi, you go to Sushi Sasabune, which is the best sushi restaurant on the island, in my opinion. It’s on South King Street. It’s, oh my goodness, it’s just the best fish there is. They don’t do any cooked fish there at all. It’s all raw fish. They are pretty strict about how you eat the sushi. They have pretty strong rules about that, but if you follow the rules, it’s the best fresh fish you are ever going to eat in Hawaii. I think Sushi Sasabune has a really charming ambience.
What are the rules? Well, you eat sushi in one bite. You don’t put soy sauce on certain sushi, because they have prepared their own type of sauce. They just have a couple of rules; you follow those, and you will be okay. I usually just eat a lot of baby bluefin tuna; they do fantastic tuna and albacore. They also have the most incredible crab rolls. I order off the menu and sort of pick the things I like.
What about something more substantial than sushi? There are two restaurants I would recommend. One of them is Hoku’s, which is, I think, the signature restaurant at the Kahala Mandarin Hotel. The hotel has changed ownership, actually, so it may just be called the Kahala now. Hoku’s is incredible, consistently amazing. It has a menu that is very, very diverse. It has really interesting combinations. You can’t really pinpoint it to one place or culture, but it’s really amazing.
That’s right on the water, isn’t it? Yeah. I think it’s the nicest hotel on the island, just because it’s a little older and has some character. It’s classy. It has been around for a while, and it’s beautiful, with its dolphin pools and fish pools and all that. Hoku’s is situated so that you can look out over the ocean. It has an amazing ambience. A lot of wood, but, facing the water, all glass.
There is also an Italian restaurant in Kailua that my wife and I go to all the time. My wife is Italian, so we are always trying to find good Italian restaurants. This place is called Baci Bistro. It has indoor and outdoor seating. It has a pretty good wine list, and the food is consistently good. They have great steak there.
Do you feel like it’s similar to Italian restaurants everywhere else, or do you know you are in Hawaii when you’re in an Italian restaurant there? They have a lot of fish. Anywhere you go in Hawaii, you are going to get more fish on the menu than you might at an Italian restaurant somewhere else. Other than that, it feels like an Italian restaurant to me. Those would be the two restaurants I would recommend — and the sushi place makes three. Those are all the things that I would need: coffee, juice, the two restaurants, and a sushi joint. Well, there’s another place in Honolulu, called Town. I was really impressed by it. It’s a relatively new restaurant. The menu changes every day, apparently. They have a cool menu and cool combinations of things. A lot of their food is organic, and it’s really hip. That would be something I would recommend as well.
Do you do a lot of fishing? I was raised in Wyoming, and I’m sort of a fly-fisherman, so I have not done any deep-sea fishing. I plan on doing that, though. One of the guys on the show, Josh Holloway, got a boat because he is really into it. One of these days I’m going to go out with him. He invites me all the time. We have not had an opportunity to do that just yet, but we will.
Have you taken any excursions to other islands? We spent some time on Kauai and Maui. My wife and I recently went to the Big Island to spend an anniversary, actually. We had a really wonderful time. The Big Island is huge, and it’s very volcanic. It’s sort of dry. It’s an incredible place. It goes from sea level to 13,800 feet in about a 40-mile stretch. Everywhere you look, there is black volcanic rock. You can go out in the volcanic fields that are hot and pretty dangerous too. You’ve got to be careful.
Where are the places you have filmed episodes of Lost that people could recognize from the show? The North Shore is where we shoot all the beach stuff. There is a place up there called Police Beach, a.k.a. Papailoa Beach. It’s pretty restricted. I mean, we do have people coming out to the island now and trying to find locations and going to see where we are shooting. I can tell you that we have a security system, so that’s not the easiest thing in the world to do. But there are places on the North Shore that they would totally recognize. They could go over to the beach where we shot the pilot. It’s a beach people hang out on. But I can’t even tell you the name of that beach. You know, I’ve kind of gotten the local mentality around here. You ask a lot of locals what the names of things are, and they don’t know. They can tell you how to get there, but people don’t pay attention to the names of things. You ask for directions around here, and they are like, “Well, you go down here, and when you get to that bunch of trees, you go right there, and then drive along and you’ll see a bridge, and you take a left after that.”
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He Said...
Where Matthew Fox goes in Hawaii when he’s not Lost
LODGING
JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa at Ko Olina, very expensive, (800) 626-4446, www.ihilani.com
Kahala Hotel & Resort, very expensive, (800) 367-2525, www.kahalaresort.com
DINING
Baci Bistro, Italian, moderate, (808) 262-7555, www.restauranteur.com/bacibistrocom
Hoku’s, contemporary island cuisine, expensive, (808) 739-8779,
www.kahalaresort.com/dining/hoku.cfm
Lanikai Juice Bar, inexpensive, (808) 262-2383, www.lanikaijuice.com
Muddy Waters Espresso, coffee and blues music, inexpensive, (808) 254-2004
Sushi Sasabune, expensive, (808) 947-3800, members.aol.com/nobib
Town, American, moderate, (808) 735-5900, www.townkaimuki.com
SITES
Kailua Beach, www.aloha.com/~lifeguards/kailua.html
Kualoa Ranch and Activity Club, (808) 237-8515, www.kualoa.com
Lanikai Beach, www.hawaiiweb.com/oahu/beaches/lanikai_beaches.htm
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We Said... Where We Get Lost in Honolulu
LODGING
Ke Iki Beach Bungalows, Sunset Beach, moderate to expensive, (808) 638-8829,
www.keikibeach.com. We may make a few enemies by telling more people about Ke Iki, but operator Greg Gerstenberger is such a dream, we can’t help but promote his good works. Besides, despite the fact the 11 cottages just underwent a $1 million face-lift, Ke Iki is still an excellent value. And who can forget those flawless stretches of white-sand beach right outside your door?
Waikiki Prince, inexpensive to moderate, (808) 922-1544, www.waikikiprince.com. Even the website for this 30-room Honolulu hotel (www.waikikiprince.com) is uncommonly simple. But that’s where you’ll find an offer for rooms from $45 a night! You get a great rate and a clean, comfy room and are just a one-minute walk from the beach. What’s not to like?
DINING
Side Street Inn, inexpensive, (808) 591-0253. Want to know where Hawaii’s top chefs hang out? Pop into this lively eatery after hours and you may catch Alan Wong or Roy Yamaguchi digging into a platter of barbecued ribs laced with lilik’oi (passion fruit) syrup, mahi mahi crusted with furikake, or other surprising morsels showcasing local flavors. The place may be unassuming, but the food is anything but.
Waiola Store, inexpensive, (808) 949-2269. Matthew Fox and his family may like their juices and smoothies, but we prefer shaved ice — or shave ice, as they call it here. There are lots of shave ice spots around town, but Waiola (look for the ordering window outside) has more than 30 funky flavors to choose from. Mix and match (coconut, condensed milk, and adzuki beans, anyone?) for a refreshing potion that’s cheaper than a Starbucks.
ACTIVITIES
Hawaiian Fire Surf School, (888) 955-7873, www.hawaiianfire.com. On the mainland, many of us are familiar with the moving companies made up of off-duty firefighters. In Hawaii, the firefighters teach people to surf. At least they do at this popular surf academy, where the cost of lessons ($97 to $139) includes transportation to and from the beach, foam-covered surfboards, reef shoes, and, in case you’ve wiped out one too many times, a shady tent and chair onshore.
Polynesian Cultural Center, (800) 367-7060, www.polynesia.com. When on the islands, do as the islanders do. And there’s no better place to practice your South Pacific than the Polynesian Cultural Center. Here, you can learn everything from the Hawaiian hula to Tongan shuffleboard to Tahitian fishing. And then there’s the fire walking, coconut husking, tiki carving … so much culture, so little time.
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