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.
. 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."
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
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.