Patricia Clarkson
| Patricia Clarkson | |
|---|---|
 Clarkson at the Hugo premiere, New York City, November 2011 | |
| Born |
Patricia Davies Clarkson December 29, 1959 New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S. |
| Alma mater |
Fordham University Yale University |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1985–present |
| Parent(s) |
Jacquelyn Brechtel (mother) Arthur Clarkson (father) |
Patricia Davies Clarkson (born December 29, 1959) is an American actress. She has starred in many leading and supporting roles in films such as The Station Agent, The Green Mile, Far from Heaven, High Art, Dogville, Good Night, and Good Luck, Easy A, and Cairo Time. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and the Golden Globe for her performance in Pieces of April (2003). She twice won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for her recurring role in Six Feet Under. In 2015, she was nominated for a Tony Award for her performance in The Elephant Man.
Early life
Clarkson was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, the daughter of Jackie Clarkson (née Brechtel), a New Orleans politician and councilwoman, and Arthur Clarkson, a school administrator who worked at the Louisiana State University School of Medicine.[1][2] She has four sisters. Clarkson studied speech pathology at Louisiana State University, later transferring to Fordham University in New York City, where she graduated summa cum laude with a degree in drama.[3] She then earned her Master of Fine Arts (MFA) at the Yale School of Drama[4] before making her film debut in The Untouchables in 1987.
Career
Clarkson's Broadway theatre credits include The House of Blue Leaves and Eastern Standard. She had supporting roles in a series of high-profile films in her early career. Her first movie role, at age 27, was as the wife of Eliot Ness (Kevin Costner) in The Untouchables. She was also featured in The Dead Pool, Rocket Gibraltar and Everybody's All-American. She starred in the short-run television series Davis Rules, and in the miniseries Alex Haley's Queen.
More often a character actor than a leading woman, she has also appeared in such major films as The Green Mile (1999), Far from Heaven (2002), Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) and Lars and the Real Girl (2007). Her breakthrough role was in High Art (1998) where her portrayal of Greta, a German, drug-addicted lesbian former model, gained rave reviews. She has said about acting, "I’m deeply invested in everything I do, and it’s a good thing, because acting is the only thing I know how to do."[5]
In 2002, she originated her role as Sarah O'Connor (a.k.a. "Aunt Sarah") in HBO's Six Feet Under. She went on to win the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series that year for her performance, she repeated for the same role in 2006. In 2003, she gained critical acclaim and a Special Jury Prize for her work in four films that debuted at the Sundance Film Festival: All the Real Girls, The Baroness and the Pig, The Station Agent and Pieces of April.[6][7] Later that same year, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Pieces of April, in which she played an acerbic mother dying of cancer. In 2006, she portrayed Sadie Burke, in All the King's Men, set in her native New Orleans. In 2008, she had supporting roles in Elegy, as a womanizer's put-upon girlfriend, and Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona as an unhappily married housewife.
In 2008, producer Gerald Peary approached Clarkson to do the voice-over for the documentary film For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism. Says Peary, "She agreed to do the narration ... And she was so nice, and so cooperative, and so prepared, and so intelligent. And one of the key reasons she wanted to do the movie was that she regularly reads criticism, and has a genuine respect for the critic profession.[8]
Clarkson returned to New Orleans for the January 17, 2009 reopening of the Mahalia Jackson Theatre for the Performing Arts. She served as Master of Ceremonies for a gala featuring Plácido Domingo in concert with the New Orleans Opera, conducted by Robert Lyall.[9] She also made a cameo appearance in the Saturday Night Live Digital Short "Motherlover" on May 9, 2009. The video featured Andy Samberg, Justin Timberlake, and Susan Sarandon. She reprised the role on May 21, 2011 in the Digital Short "3-Way (The Golden Rule)". In 2010, she starred in Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island.[10] Clarkson was honored by the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival when she received one of the 2010 Volta awards for achievements in her career.[11]
In the fourth season of the NBC mockumentary Parks and Recreation, Clarkson began portraying the recurring role of Tammy One, Parks Department head Ron Swanson's first wife.[12]
Personal life
In response to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, Clarkson published a post for Natural Resources Defense Council's magazine OnEarth. She also released a public service announcement talking about her experiences growing up in New Orleans. Both pieces were released on July 26, 2010.[13]
Clarkson has never married and has no children.[14] Interviewed in 2016, she said, "I've never wanted to marry, I've never wanted children – I was born without that gene."[15]
Filmography
Film
Television
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1985 | Spenser: For Hire | Elizabeth Haller | Episode: "The Choice" |
| 1986 | Equalizer, TheThe Equalizer | Deborah Wade | Episode: "Breakpoint" |
| 1990 | Tales from the Crypt | Suzy | Episode: "Mute Witness to Murder" |
| 1990 | Law & Order | Laura Winthrop | Episode: "By Hooker, By Crook" |
| 1990 | The Old Man and the Sea | Mary Pruitt | Television film |
| 1991 | Davis Rules | Cosmo Yeargin | 13 episodes |
| 1992 | Blind Man's Bluff | Dr. Virginia Hertz | Television film |
| 1992 | American Story, AnAn American Story | Barbara Meade | Television film |
| 1992 | Legacy of Lies | Pat Rafael | Television film |
| 1992 | Four Eyes and Six Guns | Lucy Laughton | Television film |
| 1993 | Caught in the Act | Meg | Television film |
| 1993 | Alex Haley's Queen | Lizzie Perkins | Miniseries |
| 1994 | She Led Two Lives | Desiree Parnell | Television film |
| 1995–1996 | Murder One | Annie Hoffman | 23 episodes |
| 1996 | London Suite | Diana Nichols | Television film |
| 1996 | Wedding, TheThe Wedding | Della McNeil | Television film |
| 2000 | Wonderland | Mrs. Tammy Banger | 2 episodes |
| 2001 | Frasier | Claire French | 4 episodes |
| 2002 | Carrie | Margaret White | Television film |
| 2002–2005 | Six Feet Under | Sarah O'Connor | 7 episodes Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series (2002, 2006) |
| 2007 | American Masters | Narrator | Episode: "The American Dream" |
| 2009–2011 | Saturday Night Live | Mother | 2 episodes |
| 2011 | Parks and Recreation | Tammy Swanson I | 2 episodes |
| 2012 | The Dust Bowl | Hazel Lucas Shaw | Television film |
| 2012 | Five | Mia Knowles | Television film |
| 2015 | Broad City | Timothy's Mom | Episode: "St. Mark's" |
| 2016 | American Dad! | Meredith Fields (voice) | Episode: "The Dentist's Wife" |
| 2016 | Nature | Narrator (voice) | Episode 35.01: "Hummingbirds" |
Broadway theatre
| Year | Title | Role | Notes | Refs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1986 | The House of Blue Leaves | Corrinna Stroller (replacement) | Vivian Beaumont Theater |
[16] |
| 1989 | Eastern Standard | Phoebe Kidde | John Golden Theatre |
[17] |
| 2014 | The Elephant Man | Mrs. Kendal | Booth Theatre Nominated – Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play |
[18][19] |
References
- ↑ Patricia Clarkson profile, filmreference.com; accessed July 9, 2014.
- ↑ Patricia Clarkson Biography, movies.yahoo.com; accessed July 9, 2014.
- ↑ "Patricia Clarkson Biography". The New York Times. Retrieved January 29, 2016.
- ↑ Mayo, Jenny (March 28, 2008). "Clarkson Shifts Her Weight". Washington Times (on-line). p. D1. Retrieved August 12, 2015.
- ↑ Altmann, Howard 'Patricia Clarkson', BOMB Magazine, Spring 2010; retrieved July 21, 2011
- ↑ Gordon, Devin, "A Woman on the Verge of a Breakthrough" in Newsweek, October 20, 2003, pp. 11
- ↑ "Move Over Sundance Kids, There's a New ... Star of Indies", New York Post, January 23, 2003, p. 39
- ↑ :SXSW '09 Interview: For the Love of Movies Director & Film Critic Gerald Peary", efilmcritic.com; accessed July 9, 2014.
- ↑ Theodore P. Mahne, "Star Emcee Patricia Clarkson Shares in the Excitement over Tonight's Opera Gala", The Times-Picayune, 2009 January 17, pp. C1, C3
- ↑ "Video Interviews: Shutter Island - Martin Scorsese, Leonardo DiCaprio, Ben Kingsley, Dennis Lehane", DreadCentral.com
- ↑ JDIFF announce recipients of this year's Volta Awards, Filmbase; retrieved February 24, 2010.
- ↑ Michael Ausiello (July 28, 2011). "Patricia Clarkson to Raise Hell as Tammy 1". TVLine. Retrieved July 9, 2014.
- ↑ Patricia Clarkson (July 26, 2010). "Returning to the Gulf After BP Destroyed It". OneEarth.org.
- ↑ Kramer, Gary M. (August 1, 2014). "Patricia Clarkson: “I’m impulsive — which is why I never married or had kids” - Salon.com". Salon.com. Salon Media Group. Retrieved January 11, 2015.
- ↑ Hoby, Hermione. "Patricia Clarkson interview: 'I'd love to play an action hero!'". The Guardian. Retrieved 11 June 2016.
- ↑ "The House of Blues at LCT". LCT. April 30, 2015. Retrieved April 30, 2015.
- ↑ "Eastern Standard on Broadway". Playbill Vault. April 30, 2015. Retrieved April 30, 2015.
- ↑ Green, Jesse (December 7, 2014). "Theater Review: Bradley Cooper and Patricia Clarkson Help Free The Elephant Man". Vulture. Retrieved December 9, 2014.
- ↑ Sheward, David (December 8, 2014). "Review Roundup: 'The Elephant Man' with Bradley Cooper". Newyork.com. Retrieved December 9, 2014.
External links
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Patricia Clarkson. |
- Patricia Clarkson at the Internet Movie Database
- Patricia Clarkson at the Internet Broadway Database
- Patricia Clarkson at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
- Patricia Clarkson at AllMovie
- "Patricia Clarkson, Directors' Stealth Weapon" Michelle Orange, The New York Times, July 30, 2010
- Patricia Clarkson "Good Night, And Good Luck" Interview Future Movies, September 2, 2006