Evangeline Lilly Photograph by Anthony Mandler

Evangeline Lilly

AGE 25

HOMETOWN Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta, Canada

HER BREAKOUT MOMENT She used to do oil changes on big rigs to pay the bills. Then she toiled as an extra in The L Word and White Chicks. But Lilly hit the Hollywood jackpot earlier this year when J.J. Abrams tapped her for his ABC drama Lost. As fugitive bombshell Kate, Lilly plays a good girl gone bad — or is that a bad girl gone good?

WHY SHE'S A NATURAL FOR THIS ROLE ''I lived in grass huts in a jungle in the Philippines for three weeks with tribal people,'' she says, ''and swam in crocodile-infested rivers and climbed trees and...'' Wait a sec. Did she say crocodile-infested rivers? ''I was so friggin' desperate to bathe, I didn't care,'' Lilly explains.

USELESS TRIVIA ''I never developed hard cartilage in my ears because I played with them since I was a baby,'' says the actress. ''I can fold my ear entirely inside out, and I can put the whole thing inside itself.''

WHAT'S NEXT More island adventures on Lost.