Michael Emerson: More Than Lost's Spooky Other

Lost fans get a kick out of being freaked out by "Others" leader Benjamin Linus. His spooky look does have a lot to do with the spooky look of this actor, Michael Emerson. Lost hasn't been the same since Ben (Emerson) joined the show in season 2. And now it's hard to see Lost without them. Before joining Lost, Emerson was on the road to be typecast as just another actor playing creepy villains, as was apparent in most of his high-profile roles before Lost-for instance, Gerald "Gerry" Rankin (in the episode "Phantom," in season 1 of Law & Order: CI), among others. But on the road to getting Lost, Emerson went through a lot of different avenues as an actor before he ever met the Lost creators, or Ben.

Emerson was born on September 7, 1954, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. In 1976, Emerson first moved to New York City, hoping to become an actor. But since actor jobs were scarce, he worked to get by as a freelance illustrator and in retail jobs. Ten years later, he moved to Jacksonville, Florida, where he was an actor and director in local productions. However, being an actor wasn't getting Emerson too far, and he began to develop a new passion for teaching. He eventually decided to be an actor for a while longer, enrolling in the Alabama Shakespeare Festival's Master of Fine Acts program in 1993.

Emerson returned to New York City soon after graduation, working in the Alabama Shakespeare Festival showcase. For four years, he worked in regional theater and then landed a supporting actor role on the off-Broadway production Gross Indecency: The Trials of Oscar Wilde. But his part increased greatly when the actor originally cast as the famed gay English playwright was fired, and Emerson took his place. Playing Wilde gave Emerson his first big break as an actor and made him a rising star in the theater. He later worked alongside Uma Thurman in an off-Broadway production of The Misanthrope and played Willie Oban in Kevin Spacey's revival of The Iceman Cometh in 1999. Emerson's personal life took off as well, as he married actress Carrie Preston in 1998, and the two have been together ever since.