Something to watch tonight: Thursday 5 December
Six Feet Under (Ball, 2001-2005)
Here’s another “on this day” post.
Back in December 2008, I was lucky enough to interview the great character actor Richard Jenkins in advance of his film The Visitor. This was his first leading role in a film and he was clearly stoked about it at the same time as being incredibly modest:
Speaking to the Capital Times from his home in Rhode Island, Jenkins gave thanks to Thomas McCarthy, creator of 2004’s sleeper hit The Station Agent, for having faith in him despite his lack of marquee presence. “He asked me to read the script and I hadn’t read anything I liked more. But I told him, nobody’s going to give you the money with me in it!” But McCarthy persevered, even when one executive producer suggested just weeks before shooting that Morgan Freeman might be a more commercial choice.
2008 has been a great year for Jenkins. In the sophomoric buddy comedy Step Brothers he got to improvise scenes about dinosaurs with Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly; he was reunited with The Coen Brothers for Burn After Reading (in a part that was written for him); and in the sensitive indie he shines as a widowed academic brought back from a boundless depression by a chance New York connection with two illegal immigrants.
But carrying a film on his shoulders was a new experience. “I always wondered what it would be like, you know? Could I do it? But most of all, I didn’t want to let Tom down.” He needn’t have worried, as his performance anchors a typically humane McCarthy film about strangers thrown together and learning to appreciate and then love each other.
You can read the whole thing here (including how much he rated Niki Caro after working with her on North Country). He was such a sweetheart!
So, which out of Jenkins’ 116 IMDb screen credits should we highlight here?
I’ve chosen Six Feet Under which was, I think, where most people became aware of him. When we think about the prestige TV that came out under the HBO banner in the early part of this century, it’s easy to forget Six Feet Under but it was a huge hit at the time and extremely binge-able (at least once the DVDs came out).
There are five seasons of the show about a family of funeral directors coping with the loss of their patriarch – played by Jenkins in a role where he appears in flashbacks and dream sequences.
Sadly, The Visitor remains unavailable on any New Zealand streamer but I will jump right in and recommend it here when it does eventually appear.
Where to watch Six Feet Under
Aotearoa: Streaming on Neon
Australia: Streaming on Binge
Canada: Digital purchase from Apple
Ireland and UK: Streaming on SkyNow
India: Streaming on JioCinema
USA: Streaming on Max