Patricia Clarkson Looks Back on "Six Feet Under"

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Patricia Clarkson Explains why Playing "Six Feet Under's" 'Crazy' Aunt Sarah was "A Blessing"
by Jordan Hoffman
May 11, 2025


Three-time Emmy winner Patricia Clarkson sat down with Jesse Tyler Ferguson for his Dinner's on Me podcast and, naturally, the conversation turned to the celebrated HBO melodrama/dark comedy "Six Feet Under" from the early aughts.

Clarkson appeared as a semi-regular on the fatalistic series as the younger sister to the family matriarch played by Frances Conroy.




"Aunt Sarah," she remembered fondly, "this crazy part to play the sister. It was just such a crazy shoot. I would fly in, everyone thought I was a regular, but I wasn't."

"Well, you won two Emmys for it," Ferguson reminded her.




"But that's the writing," Clarkson demurred, citing the work of series creator Alan Ball as well as playwright Kate Robin, future "Transparent" creator Joey Soloway, Lars and the Real Girl screenwriter Nancy Oliver, and others.

"And the directing," she added. "And the actors I was surrounded with. Franny [Frances] Conroy and Kathy Bates. So when the three of us would work together, they'd say, 'Get the Three Tenors on set!' That was a blessing."




Clarkson continued, "I would get these scenes, and sometimes, as the crazy aunt, I had these [moments where] I thought, 'Oh, surely they're going to cut this down or they're going to rewrite it. But a lot of times, what I got on the page stayed.

I just learned it, I'd run it, learn my monologues. When writing is great, it doesn't take a toll on you like when you're trying to make something work."

https://ew.com/patricia-clarkson-six...ssing-11732078