Maggie Grace Says Leaving Lost Was 'the Worst Heartbreak of My Career'

Maggie Grace still remembers the role she wishes she could have held onto.

The actress, 40, revealed that she often thinks back to her role as Shannon Rutherford on Lost, which kickstarted her career. Although she was only on the show for less than two seasons, Grace recalled very quickly finding fame at just 20 years old.

“I feel for the cast of, like, Twilight or anything else where [its cast] are suddenly thrust into the spotlight when you feel very ill-prepared,” she told The Independent. “It’s a lot at that age, but I think the fact that I was the baby of the cast [helped].” 

Filming took place in a “tiny village” in Hawaii, which helped Grace feel less like she was thrown into the spotlight in Hollywood. She even described the cast and crew as “this little theater troupe.”

“It was just before social media, which was an enormous blessing for everyone’s mental health,” Grace said. “And the concept of the show being popular was just this vague, fuzzy, sort of ‘Oh, that’s nice.’”

Having grown comfortable playing Shannon, Grace confessed that when she found out her character was getting killed off six episodes into season two — back in 2005 — she was caught off guard.

“I thought they were gonna take her a little further,” she explained. “It’s still the worst heartbreak of my career. I was devastated.” 

She said she thinks she was removed from the series because her character was “a caricature of white privilege” and the plot didn’t have a need for that anymore. She also joked that “maybe I was just too good at my assigned job of being incredibly annoying.”

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

Even the way that Shannon was portrayed in her last episodes didn’t fit what Grace had in mind for her. She felt that there was more character development that she could have worked on.

“I thought maybe she would do something surprising, or have another color [to her personality],” she said. “Maybe she’d, at the last moment, redeem herself and be incredibly self-sacrificial in some way. I guess there were flashes of it, but not in the way I hoped in terms of an arc.” 

She added: “That’s a selfish actor’s point of view. They definitely had bigger fish to fry.”

Since her departure from Lost, Grace has starred in the trilogy of Taken films, played Irina in the Twilight Saga and appeared in the series Fear the Walking Dead. She also has become a mom with husband Brent Bushnell.

“I don’t think I’ve slept in four years,” she jokingly told the outlet.