When we finally had a cast and could see what they could do, here was an opportunity to go back and modify things. We didn't actually do that much modifying, but we did enough to make it feel as if they fit in their own skin, and we got a lot of good input from them. They're a terrific cast. They worked really hard.

I've always been a sci-fi geek, and I've always loved it. It's my favorite genre of all. The irony of ironies is that, in my early career, I just really never worked in it. "Star Trek" was very interested in me, partially because I did "From the Earth to the Moon," and I was really interested in them, but the timing just never worked out.

I ended up working on "Chicago Hope" and other things, but always with the idea that, eventually, I would want to take what I'd learned in character drama and try to apply that to the genre that I love, which is science fiction and "The Twilight Zone" type mysteries.

I feel confident that we will have a beginning, middle and end, in this season, and it was wise of NBC to then call it what it really is, which is a mini-series. "24" is a really good example, in that there was a definitive beginning, middle and end for the first season. They had a slightly different format than we have, but the second season just retained Jack Bauer and a few other players, with the same basic format and idea, but it was a completely different show.

And, what we've allowed ourselves to become - and this is part of Chris' ideas - is complacent, in allowing our lives to be taken over, or at least in allowing that kind of scrutiny into our lives. We've given up a little bit of that, and this is the existential nightmare of all of that. What happens when you suddenly find out that people have been watching you, with a purpose?

What we're going for, in those humorous moments, is the absurdity of it all. The craziness of the night manager offering them an umbrella in the height of what is a horrible disaster was like, "What?!" That's Andy Greenfield, and he nailed the audition. He's the sweetest guy in the world, as is often the case with those guys, but on camera, he's so creepy that a lot of us kept saying, "You know, Andy, don't look at us like that anymore, okay? You're scaring us."

Casting is really weird. Honestly, when Alan Ruck's name came up - and I've worked with Alan before - I went, "Yes, he's perfect." He came in and read for us, which was really sweet of him because he didn't have to, and he nailed it in seconds. We knew exactly who we had. That stuff is really good and fun.