Jason Clarke is our guest this week on the Awards Tour Podcast, and Rotten Tomatoes Awards Editor Jacqueline Coley discusses his new series, Murdaugh: Death in the Family. In the Hulu series, Clarke plays Alex Murdaugh, the disgraced lawyer at the center of a real-life murder scandal. He talks about taking on true-story roles, hoping to join Heat 2, wanting to try comedy and voiceover, and shares stories from working with directors like Michael Mann, Christopher Nolan, Baz Luhrmann, Dee Rees, and Kathryn Bigelow..
Be sure to check out Murdaugh: Death in the Family, which is now streaming on Hulu, and we’ll see you on the next stop of the Awards Tour.
Jacqueline Coley for Rotten Tomatoes: Thank you for being on the podcast. I wanted to start with this list because it’s kind of impressive when I really think about it. You’ve portrayed real-life people more than a few times: Ted Kennedy, Ed White, Jerry West, and many more. Is that approach different from Fictional ones?
The decision to do it or not is the first thing. Is this a story that I feel is worth telling? Is this a story that’s going to bring something new to this incredibly well-known and followed story, where people are obsessed with it, and have been, from the ordinary punter and viewer, to magazine writers and newspaper reporters, and now the online world? Homicide detectives posted all this information regarding the breakdown of his depositions, interviews in the car, and the incident. I thought we could do with this. Then there was the great fear of “Am I going to be able to get there?” This is a 265-pound man with red hair from South Carolina. And I thought, “Well, maybe I can.” I knew some of those scenes wouldn’t be fun to shoot. I think there’s value and a point to telling this story. Some of my favorite performances are like this. F. Murray Abrams in Amadeus and Bruno Ganz, the man who played Hitler in Downfall. I knew it wouldn’t be easy. It’s going to be draining to put on 40 pounds and a fantastic wig, but a very tight one. I had contact lenses on, and [the play] ultimately ends. But you just put that out of your mind and play the character.
Murdaugh: Death in the Family is now streaming on Hulu.