Watching Lost

Rebecca Mader gets mad at allegations she was responsible for her Lost character, Charlotte’s age changes. Young Charlotte was spotted in a scene on Lost, two episodes ago. That scene was set in 1974, making her about 36-37 years old, but the Charlotte as we know it is only 28.

In a Lost podcast with producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, the two explained that Mader changed the script insinuating she had a “diva moment” —- “because she did not really want to brand herself as 37, which is what she would have had to been had we stuck to the initial script.”

In response, the actress wrote this on her Facebook page, clearly hurt about the allegations:

I’m Pissed Damon and Carlton lied about me on the most recent PODCAST. The timeline error was their mistake and they are making it out to be my fault. NOT COOL! I just wanted to say that I NEVER changed my characters age on the set of LOST as Damon and Carlton accused me of on the most recent PODCAST. Charlotte Lewis was ALWAYS meant to be 28 and born in 1979. It was written in the script EP #402!!!!!!

The producers were quick to send in their apologies to Rebecca, and admit it was indeed their mistake:

Rebecca is absolutely right and we apologize to both her and the entire fan community for screwing up the story [...] Our first mistake was the timeline gaffe, but the much more significant one was wrapping Rebecca up in this when she had nothing to do with it. Not her fault on any level. It was our bad. One hundred percent. We will say as much in a very special “Eating Crow” edition of our Podcast tomorrow. Speaking of which, what a wonderful world we live in where we can make a comment in a Podcast that triggers a response on someone’s Facebook page and that triggers a mea culpa on someone else’s blog. Ah, technology.

This is how it happened (c/o EW):

There were a gazillion questions about the timeline discrepancy in that young Charlotte clearly exists in 1974, but wasn’t supposed to be born until 1979, per a single line of dialogue courtesy of Ben back in episode #402. When we inquired as to how this happened, the intel came back that we used Rebecca Mader’s birthday, July 2, 1979 because she was actually eight years YOUNGER than the character as originally conceived/scripted. We misremembered this as having come from Rebecca herself on the set, but in fact, it came several days earlier when our continuity expert Gregg Nations pointed it out and suggested using Rebecca’s actual birthday for Charlotte. And so, the mistake was OURS. Rebecca’s production draft DID have the date as being 1979.

Even the ones working on Lost gets themselves so confused at times. Hah!