Heroes’ Masi Oka

August 2007

Tokyo-born Masi Oka is
recognized by millions for his role as the time-traveling comics enthusiast
Hiro Nakamura on the hit NBC drama Heroes. As such, it may be a surprise to some that prior to
his Emmy-nominated role in Heroes, Oka’s
first job was at George Lucas' Oscar-winning special
effects house Industrial Light & Magic, where he continues to work to this
day. He recently spoke to World Screen about what he shares with his alter ego, his
tight-knit relationship with fellow cast members and his firm belief in the
moral message behind the hit drama.

WS: Do you think the show has a moral, the idea that
anyone can become a hero?

OKA: When Tim Kring [the show’s creator] wrote the
pilot, he wrote it with that in mind. He wanted to send a message, especially
to children, and let them know that in this chaotic, very unstable world, there
are people out there—heroes—trying to make a difference. So it was
definitely something that the writers put in to give hope to a lot of our
viewers. I think it’s fantastic. As an artist, the one thing you want to do is
make a difference in a lot of people’s lives. It’s just a fantastic feeling to
be a role model for a lot of the kids growing up and to inspire them to do good
and make changes and become heroes in their own way. It’s important to have
something like that to inspire people, even if it’s metaphorical or just a
fantasy, because it puts the thought in people’s minds that they can be a hero
and they can make a change. If you’ve already started off very pessimistically
by saying “Oh what’s the use of it?,” then there’ll never be any change in the
world. To give that hope is really important, whatever form it is. If we can
give inspiration or faith to folks through a TV show, there’s no better feeling
than doing that.

There are a lot of
messages in our show. One of the messages is that different people make
different decisions in their lives. The show is about acceptance and tolerance
in our world—that’s important. This leads to people in harmony because many
confrontations result from a lack of communication and lack of understanding
and respect for each other.

WS: What made you go from being backstage at
Industrial Light and Magic to going in front of the camera?

OKA: I studied theater arts in college and I always
loved the idea of using the left side and the right side of the brain; having
that opportunity opened up my mind as an artist and as a human being. It was a
lot of fun to be able to approach any problem both creatively and logically. My
point of view of the world opened up, and I was exposed to so many different
ideas about the world. I met a lot of amazing people in the process.

The transition came after
I worked for ILM on my first big project, A Perfect Storm. I got burned out because I was on there for a
year and a half. I had no responsibilities but myself, so I wanted to give
acting a try because I knew that once I had a family commitment or big
responsibilities, there was no way I could do it. I was fortunate enough to get
a few roles off the top of the bat and ILM was kind of enough to support me in
L.A.. Six years later, I got Heroes
and that was that.

WS: How much of yourself do you put into your
character?

OKA: In any TV role, I believe there is a lot of who
you are in the character. I think that’s very true in any TV role. With Hiro
and myself, there are definitely a lot of similarities. We’re both Japanese, we
speak fluent Japanese, and we grew up in the Japanese culture. He likes
American comics. I like Japanese manga. We’re both techno-geeks. We’re both
adventurers, and we have a passion and a curiosity for life. There’s definitely
a lot of me in Hiro. Hiro is an exaggerated version of me. He’s very
passionate. He’s very optimistic. He’s very excited about everything.

WS: Do you feel a lot of pressure being in the public
eye?

OKA: I don’t think about the pressure that much. We
have a lot of fun. More than work, this is like play. I get to have a lot of
fun with my writers, my crew, my cast mates, whom I consider to be like
brothers and sisters.

I have my friends who knew
me before Heroes. I think
that’s really important because they keep me grounded. Working for ILM is
something that brings me back to my roots, and keeps me grounded as well. I
think that’s really important to have cast mates like Adrian Pasdar and Milo
Ventimiglia—veterans of this industry [who I can] learn
from—because that also keeps me grounded. It’s been a great experience,
and I’m learning a lot from them. It’s about knowing who you are and being comfortable
with that. That’s a big thing, especially in regards to being a geek in this
world. I am a geek. I love being a geek. I tell everyone to be a geek because
being a geek means that you’re passionate about something, and that’s what
makes us human and unique. I’d rather be passionate about something, whether
it’s ant farms or music or Heroes
or whatever it is, than be apathetic about everything. If you find who you are,
it’s what makes you an individual.

WS: Did you ever expect Heroes to become the hit that it did?

OKA: To be honest, no. Tim Kring wrote an amazing
pilot—a beautiful world with rich characters. We knew we would have the
genre audience but we didn’t know if it was going to hit the mainstream. We’re
just so fortunate and grateful for the way the audience reacted to the cast.
With TV shows in America, [it’s like] a lottery. You have to get a pilot, you
have to get a cast in a pilot, you have to get the pilot picked up, then you
have to be successful. To have the phenomenon that we have is literally like
winning a lottery. It does not just happen. We’re so fortunate to have what we
have, especially in the first year. It feels like we’ve been on the air for
three years because we’ve gone through so much in the first year. It’s an
amazing project. We’re just so proud of it.

WS: Are you worried you won’t be able to keep up the
viewership next season?

OKA: There’s always something like that in the back of
your mind. But we never come from a place of fear. We’re passionate about what
we do, and we hope the audience feels that way.

WS: Do you credit some of the show’s success to its
diverse cast?

OKA: It’s an international cast. I credit a lot of that
to Lost. Without Lost, a character like myself would not have been able
to flourish. When I was doing it, I was like: you have a foreign character who
speaks no English, who’s comedic and a big techno geek. How would that be
received? But if it wasn’t for Yunjin Kim and Daniel Dae Kim on Lost—foreign characters who speak only
Korean—I don’t think NBC would have been open-minded enough to take that
risk and accept that. Once they realized it worked for Lost, it’ll probably work for Heroes, because [television is evolving so that] you can
have not only a foreign character, but [place] the foreign character as one of
the big main characters. They realize that an international cast will also mean
big money for them because it can sell to a lot of places. It’s a smart
business move. It’s also a reflection of our world.

The one thing is that the
writing staff could be a little more diverse. It’s slowly happening.
Fortunately, the writers are very collaborative, open-minded and generous with
their words. They will listen to us, [especially pertaining to] what my
character wouldn’t say. The bonsai incident is one example. In the pilot, Tim
Kring wrote ‘bonsai’ when he stopped the clock. But ‘bonsai’ means little tree
in Japanese, like the bonsai tree. So that’s when I said, “Tim, I think you
mean ‘banzai’ here. But the word ‘banzai’ has wartime connotations. When you
win a war you say ‘banzai.’ So I suggested to Tim Kring, well, can I modernize
it for what a 20-year-old modern Japanese character [would say]? And Tim said,
go ahead, and that’s how ‘yatta’ came about. We’re just fortunate that I have
my Japanese cultural background and I’m allowed to [have] input, and [they are
willing to] integrate it into the show.

WS: How do you see your career after Heroes?

OKA: Well, I won’t be a hero anymore, but I won’t be
bored. Fortunately, I’m in two movies that are coming out, which are Get
Smart and a film called Quebec. Heroes is amazing in terms of getting public recognition. From there, we’re
hoping to parlay that into a longer career after that.