Patricia Clarkson Dominates HBO's New 'Sharp Objects'

Few actresses have taken a classier, riskier, slower route to success than slyly subversive Patricia Clarkson, 58, who disdained mainstream roles (and TV) for decades, earned cachet in prestige roles (an Oscar nomination for Pieces of April, two Emmys for Six Feet Under, a Tony nomination for The Elephant Man), and scored the most interesting part of her life as Adora, Amy Adams' ultra cultivated, smothering mother in HBO’s new eight-part miniseries Sharp Objects. "I told Amy [that] Adora is the most perfect woman I've ever played," says Clarkson in a purring voice that carries traces of her New Orleans youth and Yale School of Drama polish. "Perfect hair, perfect nails, and a raging river of emotion lurking beneath. When you see the last episode, you’ll say, 'Oh my God, I talked to that scary woman on the phone!'"

Adams plays an alcoholic, mom-traumatized reporter investigating young girls' deaths in her hometown, Wind Gap, Mo., where Adora runs a hog-butchering empire, rules the social set with an iron fist, and regards her daughters as possessions. "There’s a lyrical quality to her, a dichotomy, a manipulativeness that I've never gotten to play before," says Clarkson. "It's all about keeping people close, not letting them go."

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Wind Gap is like her personal dollhouse, with her daughters as her favorite dolls. "Would I like to play a superhero in a unitard? Sure, but I'm happy to play complicated, surprising characters that are essential to the story, not the dumb roles that put women of a certain age in secondary roles. Now I can pick and choose."

Clarkson, whose proposed rallying cry for Hollywood women is "more pay, more say, no lay," refuses to sell out in ways some actresses feel they must. "There are certain parts I won't play: sadly cheesy love objects or just mothers, the archetypal horrible boss that has absolutely no texture, no voice, or asexual characters. I won’t play women that I feel degrade women at a certain age. Because we actually have more to offer than we ever had in our 20s and 30s and 40s. People are finally realizing that women in their 40s, 50s, 60s can sell tickets. People want to see us, people want to see us thrive. They want to see us complicated and not perfect. We can make you money!"