Paradise Lost?
October 6, 2006 at 03

00 PM
As Dominic Monaghan complains to press and ratings stumble, some see cloudy skies ahead for ABC mystery-drama.
Dominic Monaghan, the Lord of the Rings actor who plays former rock star and heroin addict Charlie Pace on ABC's hit show Lost, is grumpy. He told reporters this week that he sometimes gets fed up with working on a show with such a large ensemble cast, because it makes getting screen time a political process.
"It's tough being involved in a shoot with a large cast," he told Bang Showbiz. "Just the sheer politics can drag you down. It's like, 'So-and-so is not getting screen time. So-and-so is not showing up on time. So-and-so isn't behaving well on set.'"
Meanwhile, several news outlets have made note of the fact that the Lost season-three premiere was down 25 percent from its season two debut. The episode, which aired Wednesday, October 4, was watched by 18.9 million compared to 23.5 million in September of last year.
E! Online columnist Joal Ryan wrote yesterday that the show is "in recovery mode after an unpopular resolution to the series' first-season cliffhanger."
Brett Love on TV blog TVSquad.com writes today that if Lost's ratings don't improve, CBS might sneak up on it.
"If this season trends anything like the last, and the show starts from a base with 4 million less viewers, there could be a challenger to that Wednesday at 9:00 throne. And that challenger would be Criminal Minds."
Show creator J.J. Abrams recently
told the presshttp://www.tv.com/story/story.html&story_id=6604?tag=news_features;img;2 what he thought about Lost's third season.