Lana Lang (Smallville) - Portrayal

Portrayal

Creators Alfred Gough and Miles Millar were initially trying to find someone for the role of Clark Kent, but Kristin Kreuk was the first to be cast, as Lana Lang. Casting director Coreen Mayrs sent David Nutter, the director of the pilot episode, a tape of sixty-nine people and the second person on the tape was Kreuk. They loved her audition tape so much they immediately showed her to the network. For one of her auditions, she read the graveyard scene with Tom Welling; the network thought they had "great chemistry". Jade Unterman and Louise Grant portrayed the character as a child and an elderly woman, respectively.

At the time she was cast as Lana, Kreuk had no idea who the character was in Superman lore. Her uncle, who owned a comic book shop, filled her in on the details and she learned more from the producers. Kreuk realized that the character in the comics and her character on the show were two different people. As a result, Kreuk learns about the development of Lana as Lana is learning in the show, just as Welling does with Clark Kent. When asked if her being cast as a traditionally red haired character caused outcry from fans, Kreuk believes that whoever did "got over it pretty fast". By season three, Kreuk had decided to "invest" herself less in her character, as she felt that her character’s ultimate development was entirely in the hands of the producers. She no longer became frustrated when the producers had Lana doing things that Kreuk felt were out of character, instead trusting that they would find the right direction for the character.

Kreuk enjoyed the fourth season because it gave her the chance to stretch her acting abilities with Lana’s storyline involving the spirit of Countess Margaret Isobel Thoreaux. According to the actress, "That was a lot of fun; I thought it was funny as well It really was wonderful to be able to stretch and play this driven woman who has a goal and is going to reach it, and in the meantime she’s going to be sexy doing it. That was a lot of fun for me because the show isn’t realistic so, as actors, we get to play with different types of things." Kreuk says her strangest moment on the show was playing a vampire in season five's "Thirst", an experience she remembers as "uncomfortable" due to the fake blood they covered her in. Kreuk left the series at the end of the seventh season, but appeared in five episodes in season eight as a guest star.

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