JJ Abrams 'sorry' for Evangeline Lilly's traumatic Lost nude scene

JJ Abrams (left) has reached out to apologise to Evangeline Lilly. Photos / Getty Images

Director JJ Abrams says he has tried to make contact with Evangeline Lilly after the actress revealed this week she was left trembling and in tears after being "cornered" into doing a partially nude scene on the TV show Lost.

Abrams, who made a name for himself directing Lost, has released a statement to ET expressing regret about the incident.

"Our response to Evie's comments in the media was to immediately reach out to her to profoundly apologise for the experience she detailed while working on Lost. We have not yet connected with her, but remain deeply and sincerely sorry," he said. "No person should ever feel unsafe at work. Period."

Lilly told the Lost Boys podcast this week that she had a few bad experiences while playing Kate in Lost.

"In season 3, I'd had a bad experience on set with being basically cornered into doing a scene partially naked, and I felt had no choice in the matter," she said. "And I was mortified and I was trembling when it finished. I was crying my eyes out and I had to go on do a very formidable, very strong scene thereafter.

"In season 4, another scene came up where Kate was undressing and I fought very hard to have that scene be under my control.

"And I failed to control it again. So I then said, 'That's it, no more. You can write whatever you want — I won't do it. I will never take my clothes off on this show again.' And I didn't."

Lilly said her character was "kinda cool" but as the show went on "she became more and more predictable and obnoxious."

"I felt like my character went from being anonymous, really having her own story and her own journey and her own agendas, to chasing to men around the island. And that irritated the s**t out of me," Lilly said.

"I did throw scripts across rooms when I'd read them because I would get very frustrated by the diminishing amount of autonomy that she had and the diminishing amount of her own story that there was to play. There's nothing wrong with women's lives being characterised by their relationships.

"I think that often happens to men and women. But there was this eventual lack of dimension to what was going on with her," she said.

Lilly is currently promoting her new movie Ant-Man and the Wasp, in which she plays the first female Marvel superhero to headline her own film.