In 2004, Daniel Dae Kim and his wife and two children moved to Honolulu for a month while he shot the pilot episode for Lost. He thought at the time that if the show got canceled, at least he could say they lived in Hawaii for a month. That one month turned into two, and then three, and then a year, and then a few more. Fifteen years later, Kim and his family are still there.
“There’s this thing called the aloha spirit, which is actually real,” Kim explained to me recently over the phone. “There’s a kindness to the people here that I hadn’t experienced in other places where I’ve lived.”
Although he still owns a home in Los Angeles and often travels for work, Hawaii is Kim’s home base. Having grown up as a minority in a Pennsylvania steel town, Kim is comfortable now in a place with a robust Asian-American community. Diversity and representation are important to Kim, both in life and at work.
In 2017, after seven seasons as a regular cast member on CBS’s Hawaii Five-0, Kim, along with co-star Grace Park, left the series after the network passed on offering them the same salary as their white co-stars. Following his departure, Kim later said: “It’s possible to be grateful and respectful of colleagues and still maintain a steadfast sense of your self-worth.”
On April 12, Kim is back on the big screen in the upcoming Hellboy movie, playing the role of Ben Daimio, an Asian-American character created in the comic books by Mike Mignola. The role initially went to Ed Skrein, who removed himself from the movie after realizing the character’s origins, saying, “It is clear that representing this character in a culturally accurate way holds significance for people.”
GQ recently spoke with Kim to reminisce about Lost and to talk about diversity and whitewashing in Hollywood, how the conversation on both can continue, and what it’s like to turn 50.
GQ: It must be hard some days living in Hawaii to wake up and actually push yourself to get some work done. You ever find that to be a challenge, to just want to hang out?
Daniel Dae Kim: I do, because that’s what everyone else is doing here. [Laughs] Right now, I’m looking out my window, it’s 86 degrees and the bluest skies you’ll ever see. I’m looking at palm trees swaying in the breeze. It’s incredibly beautiful and serene.
I’m going to ask you a lot of questions about Lost because it was my favorite television show. What did you make of the character you were playing, Jin, initially when you read the scripts?
I was concerned. As an actor who had been around the block a bit, my biggest fear was shooting the pilot episode and then having the show get canceled, because we wouldn’t really get to watch this character develop. And where the character starts isn’t a great place in terms of cultural representation. He was an overbearing male stereotype.
The relationship between Sun and Jin wasn’t explored very deeply in the pilot, given the number of characters that were being introduced. So right way, I had a conversation with Damon [Lindelof]. He assured me the character was going to grow and that he was going to deepen, and that what we saw in the pilot wasn’t going to be what we were going to get for the entirety of the series. I put my trust in him, and thankfully he was good to his word. Through six seasons, you watched Jin evolve arguably more than any other character on the show, and that’s what made it so satisfying to play him.
So much happens in the first season. When the light comes on in the hatch to end season one, did you know where that storyline was going?
I didn’t know. We would see Damon and Carlton [Cuse, the show's screenwriter], and the first thing we would ask was: What’s going on, who’s in the hatch, what’s in the hatch? They were coy about it. Which is okay. Because when you think about life, you really don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow, or the day after. You can make plans, but there’s no way of knowing for sure what our future’s gonna be. The show reflected life in that way. That was the way I was able to justify not knowing what was going to happen in the future.
How did you feel when Jin and Sun died on the island timeline in season six?
It was bittersweet, but in some ways, it was also very satisfying. It was how his story needed to end. He died for love. He died for his wife. He did it because he made a promise to her that he would never leave her side. That was incredibly moving for me for someone to make that choice, especially when you consider what most of us were thinking about Jin after the first episode of the series.
I feel like even with all the other shows that have come after Lost, no show has come close in terms of fan interest and the Internet wanting to figure out every mystery. Game of Thrones is close, but Lost was still on another level to me.
When Lost happened, we were just on the brink of social media. Twitter wasn’t really happening at the time. There was no Reddit, and podcasts were just becoming a thing. What was happening was Internet forums... Had Lost happened now, I really do think it would have exploded in a way on social media that it couldn’t have at the time when it aired. I do think other shows have taken the baton in terms of fan engagement. The Walking Dead, in many ways, is similar to Lost. It’s a multicultural cast dealing with a post-apocalyptic event. We have questions of survival amidst things that are supernatural. I think Game of Thrones is also similar. Lost really ushered in this era of binge-watching and this notion that social media and the Internet could be more than just a companion piece to the viewing experience on television.
Any thoughts on a potential Lost remake?
That’s way beyond my control. But as long as it’s well done, I would be open to seeing it. Key phrase: It needs to be well done. There are so many reboots and remakes these days that don’t have the soul of the original story.
With Hellboy, when Ed stepped aside for the role of Ben Daimio, did you see that as a huge step in the Hollywood conversation about diversity and whitewashing?
I did. It felt like a huge step. We as minority actors can argue for diversity until we are blue in the face. But Ed’s action, not just his statement, but his action, highlighted the fact it needs to be a collective effort. It needs to be something that is understood and championed by people who are not just Asian or African-American or Latino. It’s a collective effort. That’s really the way change comes into place.
You said in another interview that “diversity is more than just a buzzword to me. It’s my life.” Could you explain that?
Because I became aware of this ideal as a kid, I didn’t know what the name of it was. I did know when I was in the playground in elementary school, and they were picking sides for teams, that my race should not have been a factor in whether I was picked or not. I was the class president of my high school for three years and I remember how much race played into my decision not only to run, but how I campaigned. To use a Lost term, I was aware that I was an other for a long time before I knew to even attach a name to it.
I really admire and envy people who say “I don’t ever see race.” because I think that’s a really privileged place to be. The fact that people can say they never see race is because it’s never affected them in an adverse way. I’ve never had a choice but to see race and so it’s just a different way of explaining this notion of diversity and how it’s affected my career and my life.
In the writing industry, we talk about diversity a lot, and it is a topic that will come up, and then it goes away. How can Hollywood make sure that this isn’t a topic that will just come and go?
Do great work. Make great shows. Make great movies. Create quality material. I’m an entertainer above all. I’m not a politician. My number one job is to make a project that has something important to say but more importantly to entertain. The way to keep diversity from becoming a fad is to create content that is so strong that you don’t even think about the fact it’s being created and written by someone who you don’t traditionally see as being a creator. Jordan Peele is doing a great job of that right now.
Do you feel like this whole diversity conversation is trending in the right direction?
It’s hard to say. History has always proved to be a pendulum of sorts. We’ve seen eras of great expansion and contraction. At the same time as we’re talking about diversity, we have a rise in hate crimes across America. It’s hard to say. I hope so. It’s what I’ve been working for and what I’ll continue to work for. Honestly, I look forward to a day when we’re no longer talking about diversity, because it will be so understood and so assumed and such a part of how we live that it’s a non-issue. That’s really the goal for me. To be honest, there are times that I wish I didn’t have to talk about it. I wish there were times when i wasn’t asked about it. But the fact is, we’re not at a place where we can just afford to ignore it. Yet.
You started your own production company, 3AD Media, in 2013. Do you feel like you have more responsibility to put diverse people in different roles, whether it’s behind the scenes or in front of the camera?
It’s one of the reasons I became a producer in the first place. I realize the place where I’m at in my career is very privileged. To be able to produce a show is not something many people get to do. If I’m going to be allowed to do it, I’m going to do it in a way where I can populate shows with the world that I see. Historically, independent filmmakers often write from their own experience, which is why you have people like Woody Allen writing about the Jewish-American experience in New York, but you don’t see a lot of diversity in his movies because he’s writing what he knows. So why shouldn’t I take a chance to create what I know and put that on a spectrum of what we can call our human experience.
For your role in Hellboy, did you dive into the source material?
I did. I wasn’t that familiar with the comics beforehand, but I did see the two previous movies. I was pleasantly surprised that Mike Mignola created this Asian-american character because ultimately, it’s about the creation of these characters. The people who decide what’s in their imagination goes on the page. I give Mike a lot of credit for putting someone like Ben Daimio in his work and now I’m the the beneficiary of it.
You turned 50 last year. Did that number mean anything to you? I know sometimes people like to reflect on these age milestones. .
It did matter to me. I consider myself very fortunate in that being a male, the window of opportunity of being considered a leading man is much longer than it is for women in our industry, which is unfortunate. Ageism is a thing in Hollywood, and so, even though I don’t necessarily feel 50, and I don’t think I look 50, the fact that people see that digit next to my name, they start to put me in a different category in terms of the roles I get to play.
How has your personal style changed as you’ve gotten older?
I tend to be more classic in the clothes that I wear. We’ve all seen the 55-year-old dude with a beer belly, wearing a T-shirt. I want to make sure I’m not that guy. [Laughs.] So, my taste has gotten a little bit more classic. I appreciate things that stand the test of time a little bit more. I’m less susceptible to trends.
Do you ever look at old photos and say, “what were you thinking, Daniel?”
Come on now, of course! I grew up in the age of Miami Vice. Parachute pants were in my past for sure.
Those might become fashionable again.
Absolutely. Maybe I should have saved them. I think you can dig up a few pictures where I have a mullet too because I was business in the front and party in the back.