When the producers of Lost first conceived the character of Mr. Eko, he was simply a gentle, upstanding Nigerian priest. And after an onscreen career full of drugs and thugs, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje jumped at the chance to play such a role. ''When you're a large black man in Hollywood, the obvious stereotype is one of force and menace,'' says the 39-year-old actor, whose 6'2'' build and hulking shoulders are just as imposing in person. ''I thought I wouldn't mind showing a different facet to my character.'' The good news? Once the producers saw a tape of his breakthrough performance as prison bully Simon Adebisi on HBO's Oz, they knew he was the man for the job. But his sheer power in the role compelled them to give Mr. Eko a new complexity, to add a darker edge, to make him...a former drug thug.
It was as if Akinnuoye-Agbaje himself had been plopped down in the middle of an irony-filled Lost flashback. The switch, he says, came as ''a bit of a shock. I was devastated.'' But he ultimately embraced the backstory, in which Eko assumed the identity of his Catholic clergyman brother, Yemi, who'd been killed by government troops when he tried to stop a drug deal. ''This guy murdered and plundered to stay alive, but he traded his soul for his brother's,'' explains Akinnuoye-Agbaje, referencing Eko's childhood decision to kill a man so his brother wouldn't have to. ''He's running around in his priest outfit still killing people. If you're an actor, that's just delicious.''
As soon as Akinnuoye-Agbaje arrived in season 2 as part of the ''Tailie'' invasion, Eko's struggle to embrace his dual nature instantly helped make the character a looming presence on Lost — no easy task on a sprawling series that at the time featured 14 regular cast members, including some scene-stealing Emmy nominees. Eko made such an impression on castaways and fans alike that his Nov. 1 death — after the island's mystical smoke monster gave him a brutal bashing — was all the more unexpected.
Though producers say they envisioned Eko's death from the beginning and knew Akinnuoye-Agbaje might not be sticking around for the long haul, the actor is the first Lost star to vote himself off the island. (He's the fifth series regular to leave the show.) After Eko's first flashback episode aired last season, Akinnuoye-Agbaje felt ''the character was complete. It was such a well-written episode that I knew I would be able to sew him up in a season.'' Says exec producer Carlton Cuse: ''In a perfect world it would've been great to have Mr. Eko for a little longer. But it was the best time to go our separate ways.''
Tearing into a lobster at Cafe Med in L.A., Akinnuoye-Agbaje looks more like a pre-priesthood Eko, sporting braids, ripped jeans, and a white tank top. He sprinkles his speech with casual references to his devout Buddhism, but exudes a high-energy charisma that's nothing like Eko's Zen state. He also talks more — a lot more — than his character, and often explodes with deep laughter.
Speaking in his native British accent (which he's never used in any role), he explains why leaving ABC's hit show was actually a ''joyous'' moment. His heightened profile, he says, has opened doors to potential financiers for his longtime pet project: Akinnuoye-Agbaje plans to direct and star in an autobiographical film he wrote about growing up in foster care and on the tough streets of London. (Africans who emigrated to England in the 1960s and '70s often willingly placed their children in foster care while they adjusted to life in a new country.) ''People that I'd approached [for funding] are now approaching me,'' says the actor. ''It's an opportunity I can't miss.''
The script ends when he reunites with his parents as a teenager in the '80s, but in real life, what happened next provided plenty of material for a sequel. While he planned to follow in his lawyer father's footsteps, he got sidetracked by modeling gigs that eventually led to acting. After landing an episode of the Fox cop series New York Undercover in 1995, he was hooked. Roles in films like Congo, Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, The Mummy Returns, and The Bourne Identity soon followed, but Akinnuoye-Agbaje made his biggest impact with a tour-de-force stint from 1997 to 2000 as gang leader Adebisi on HBO's violent prison drama Oz. Five years later, as he was shooting his role as (what else?) a powerful drug lord in the 50 Cent drama Get Rich or Die Tryin', the casting director for Lost — a show the actor had never seen — came calling. Akinnuoye-Agbaje swears that he's never been as bad as his most memorable characters. ''I've never dealt drugs, killed anybody, [or] raped anybody,'' he says. ''But I know what it is to suffer. You don't have to go chop somebody's head off to know that pain.'' As such, it was his own pathos-filled history — both on screen and off — that gave Mr. Eko such a gloomy edge. At his suggestion, producers changed the original name, Omecca, to Eko in order to be consistent with Akinnuoye-Agbaje's own Nigerian tribal lineage; he also advised them to add a ''Mr.'' to the wayward priest's moniker. ''Carlton and I looked at each other like it was the silliest thing in the world,'' exec producer Damon Lindelof says. ''Then we kept saying it, and we realized there was something really cool about it.'' Akinnuoye-Agbaje's active involvement in his character's development became both a blessing and a curse over the course of his first season. ''Adewale's process is complicated,'' says Cuse. ''He needs to discuss it, process it, and make it his own. That's harder to do on a television schedule, but it ultimately leads to great work.'' His time in Hawaii — which can (for better or worse) leave a person feeling distanced from the rest of the world — proved difficult for him. He had to move to Oahu, a place he'd never been, in about two weeks. He was afforded little of the prep time he relishes. And he struggled with his newfound visibility. ''I felt like I'd landed on the moon,'' he says. ''I'm very private, and I don't like public influence on what I'm doing.'' Mostly, though, he struggled with playing the same person every week. ''I'm primarily a movie actor because there's a lot more flexibility,'' he notes. ''I never like to get lazy, sitting in a character two or three years, him getting fat and having grandchildren. I like to hit and run.'' Toward the end of last season, he met with Cuse and Lindelof to discuss his future, and agreed to stick around for a few season 3 episodes. ''There was an ongoing dialogue [when he signed on] about what the longevity of the character would be,'' Lindelof explains. ''And we all decided the shocking and emotional death would be the best way to go.'' As Eko's end grew imminent, the actor's offscreen life became more trying: Both of his parents passed away over the summer (''I'd rather not even mention it, to be honest. It's still too fresh''). In September, he was pulled over in Waikiki and charged with driving without a license, an unfortunate circumstance that called to mind the 2005 DUI arrests of fellow Tailies Cynthia Watros and Michelle Rodriguez. Charges were dropped when he produced his license — which he'd left in a pants pocket at home. ''[Media reports] tried to lump me [with Watros and Rodriguez],'' he says, ''but I don't drink.'' Despite leaving behind a powerful character on a huge hit show, Akinnuoye-Agbaje is happy to be scouting for projects back on the mainland. (So far, he's signed to voice the town crier in the upcoming Jim Carrey CGI feature Horton Hears a Who.) Already, island life is becoming a faded memory. ''When you're out there, you're trekking, you're sweating,'' he says. ''It's not the paradise that you think it is.'' He does, however, still keep ''a little bit of Hawaii'' with him in the form of a single black pearl on a black rope necklace. And lest you think he's ungrateful for an experience that made him a star, he carefully adds this coda: ''Lost has been a huge learning curve — spiritually, professionally, culturally. It'll always be a part of me.'' 