NBC Photo: Paul Drinkwater

CCI: How much of the real you do we see in Hiro Nakamura?

MO: I think with any role, especially a TV role, there's definitely a big part of you in it. Especially after you create a role, the writers start running the two together. They see who you are as an actor and they try to include some of you in the role. For instance, the sword-fighting stuff. I do that and they've put that in. So, I would say about fifty percent. I mean we grow together with the characters as actors and as human beings, and the writers also grow as well and we find a rhythm. So we become symbiotic in that aspect.

CCI: Heroes is a graphic novel come to life. Are you a comics fan off screen, and if so, what are your personal favorites?

MO: I don't read American comics per se. I watched all the movies, and watched some of the cartoons, especially like the Saturday morning Road Runner type cartoons, but not the graphic novels. I grew up on Japanese Manga though, so I still read those. One of my favorite authors is Naoki Urasawa. He's done some fantastic work like Pluto, which is an homage to the Astro Boy series, and Monster. He does really good psychological thrillers. He also has some interesting sports ones like Happy!, too. I wish I could say I'm an American comics fan, and I am, but I didn't follow it as religiously as I did the Japanese stuff.

CCI: Are you still working at ILM (Industrial Light and Magic)?

MO: I am, but to be perfectly honest with you, my role at ILM has diminished greatly because I don't have the time to commit to it, like I used to.

CCI: Is your career path now to be a full time actor?

MO: You know, I love doing both sides of the work. Eventually I would like to go into writing or possibly directing. I mean, directing is my ultimate goal because it allows me to use both sides of my brain. I know what it means to be in front of the camera and I know what it means to be behind the camera, behind the scenes. So my ultimate career path is probably directing. I definitely love my roots at ILM, unfortunately I can't develop anything new like write new programs for them because of my time constraints.

CCI: What were some of the films you worked on?

MO: Wow, well I worked on over twenty films: Pirates of the Caribbean, The Perfect Storm, the Star Wars films, I hopped around quite a bit over there. I was a programmer. My technical title was Lead Research and Development Technical Director.

With Star Wars there was a whole explosion effect of Obi Wan Kenobi's chase sequence through the asteroids and they wanted a way to destroy the asteroids. So they came up with different shots, to blow up the asteroid in a million pieces, but they didn't have the software, so they'd say "Masi can help us out," and I'd come up with software, and write the tools to create that explosion and I would teach it to the artists and they would adjust it and tweak it to get the image they wanted.

For Pirates of the Caribbean they used a lot of the water stuff I wrote for The Perfect Storm. You know, lots of particles of water stuff, and their interactions. Most of the stuff in Pirates was Davey Jones and the water dripping off him, and being able to control the drip. So they can say at this frame I want four drips, or streams down his face and we could do that.

A director may just say, "Okay this is great, but let's get a little shine off here, and at this moment I want the splash to come." Of course, you can't time that in the practical world. But with CG you can do all that.

CCI: So how did you go from working at ILM to acting?

MO: After The Perfect Storm, which was my first big movie, I was on that project from beginning to end, about a year and half. And after that I realized I kind of got a little burned out and thought I didn't have any responsibilities really, only to myself, and thought I should give this acting thing a shot.

So I came down to L. A. to pursue the acting thing because I didn't want to regret not doing it later in life. At least this way even if I didn't make it I'd have stories to tell my grandkids. I might end up looking like Jabba the Hut, but I'd have an Oscar and I could tell my grandkids, "Yeah, I tried the whole acting try, and I might be old and fat, but at least I have an Oscar."

I only gave myself a year to make it, which of course is very naive. Because anyone who's trying to pursue a career in the entertainment industry knows that it's a marathon, not a sprint. But I made a bet with ILM that was signed into my contract, that if I didn't get a recurring role in a pilot or a supporting role in a film during my first year in L. A., then I'd go back up to San Francisco full time.

They had an office down here in Los Angeles, so I said if things didn't work out I could go to Sony Imageworks, or other places, but they said, "No, no, we have an office down in L. A., so you can do that while you're pursuing acting." Of course, they were probably thinking that one year isn't enough time to land an acting career, so he'll probably be back.

As it turned out I did get a recurring role in a pilot that unfortunately didn't get picked up, but that fulfilled my contract, but I was still delivering stuff for Star Wars II and they were happy with my work so they realized this is a win-win situation, so we just kept at it. And here it is now, five years later, and I'm on Heroes.

Masi Oka as Hiro Nakamura
NBC Photo: Chris Haston

CCI: Some think of Hiro as the leader of Heroes, the one character who willingly embraces his powers. Is Hiro the character that the group revolves around?

MO: Oh, I don't know. That's a writer question. Tim Kring is the one who created the character Hiro, who was actually the last character to be created, and there's a reason why his name is Hiro. It wasn't just a pun.

I think of it as an ensemble show so everybody is a piece of the puzzle. Though my personal opinion, as an actor, is that Peter is kind of the leader because he's kind of like the one, kind of like Neo (from The Matrix) in a sense. And I think he is the most powerful because he can control everything. He can suck up everyone's powers and he can choose what to use and what not to use. But of course Hiro's powers are powerful and he has more mastery than at least Peter does at this time. But who knows what will happen in the future?

It's interesting the leader question comes up because there's really no past, there's no JLA or I guess in this case, like the JLI (Justice League International). But we haven't formed a league yet. Of course I say "yet" because I don't know if they're going to do it, but they haven't yet.

CCI: Do you think all these characters are destined to be together?

MO: I think so. I would think Peter and Hiro would be together, just because of the reference of the Hiro name. But it's cool because you'll see a glimpse of that in episode 20, which is kind of a future based episode. You'll see whether there's a "JLI" or not.

CCI: If you had the ability to control time and space, what is the one thing you'd go back and change?

MO: Oh man, I'd totally go back to my sophomore year. I'd go back and tell myself not to ask that girl out. I mean, that was ten years of therapy there, so that's what I would do (laughs).

CCI: What was your experience at Comic-Con like last year?

MO: It was fantastic. It was still a little inconspicuous as a lot of people didn't know us, but there were diehard fans who knew who we were. Unfortunately I didn't get to experience Comic-Con like going down to the show floor. But to me, that's a big part of Comic-Con. So I was hoping for that, but I'm thinking, maybe this year I'll head to the floor.

CCI: Maybe those days are gone for you actually?

MO: Well, maybe. But for sure that's our home crowd. We knew we had something special when we were making it, but it was very cool to see when we premiered the pilot at Comic-Con that it was well received. And I'm very happy to portray a character that kind of represents us in a good light.

The problem that worries me, though is that Hiro started out so successfully by embracing his powers, how does he top that? I'm worried it'll be failure after failure after failure.

CCI: So what is the fame thing like for you now?

MO: Well, it's definitely surreal. It's fantastic that we have such passionate fans. We have a show that people like and, with me, a character that people can connect to. I had kind of hoped it would occur in steps, because it really is going from obscurity to fame and people recognizing me everywhere I go. But our fans are great. They're very passionate.

Can you please thank the fans for their generous support? We make the series for them, and we're so grateful that they're enjoying the show and we're having a blast making the show for them. So please let them know.

CCI: You just did!