| Six Feet Under | |
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| Genre | Drama Black comedy |
| Created by | Alan Ball |
| Starring | Peter Krause Michael C. Hall Frances Conroy Lauren Ambrose Freddy Rodriguez Mathew St. Patrick Jeremy Sisto Justina Machado James Cromwell Rachel Griffiths |
| Theme music composer | Thomas Newman |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 5 |
| No. of episodes | 63 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Alan Ball Robert Greenblatt David Janollari Alan Poul (Seasons 2-5) Bruce Eric Kaplan (Seasons 4-5) Rick Cleveland (Season 5) |
| Running time | 50–60 minutes |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | HBO |
| Original run | June 3, 2001 – August 21, 2005 |
| External links | |
| Official website | |
Six Feet Under is an American television drama series created and produced by Alan Ball. It premiered on the premium cable network HBO in the United States on June 3, 2001 and ended on August 21, 2005, spanning five seasons and 63 episodes. The show was produced by Actual Size Films and The Greenblatt/Janollari Studio and was shot on location in Los Angeles and in Hollywood studios. The show revolves around members of the Fisher family, who run their funeral home in Los Angeles, and their friends and lovers. The series traces these characters' lives over the course of five years. The ensemble drama stars Peter Krause, Michael C. Hall, Frances Conroy, Lauren Ambrose, Freddy Rodriguez, Mathew St. Patrick and Rachel Griffiths as the show's seven central characters.
Six Feet Under received widespread critical acclaim, particularly for its writing and acting, and consistently drew high ratings for the HBO network. Six Feet Under has frequently been described by critics as one of the greatest television series of all time.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] It won numerous awards, including three Golden Globes, nine Emmys and three Screen Actor's Guild Awards. It also generated controversy for its graphical depiction of sexuality and some of the themes it addressed.
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The show stars Peter Krause as Nathaniel Samuel "Nate" Fisher Jr., the son of a funeral director who, upon the death of his father (Richard Jenkins), reluctantly becomes a partner in the family funeral business with his brother David (Michael C. Hall). The Fisher clan also includes widow Ruth (Frances Conroy) and daughter Claire (Lauren Ambrose). Other regulars include mortician and family friend Federico Diaz (Freddy Rodriguez), Nate's on-again, off-again girlfriend Brenda Chenowith (Rachel Griffiths), and David's long-term boyfriend Keith Charles (Mathew St. Patrick).
On one level, the show is a conventional family drama, dealing with such issues as relationships, infidelity, and religion. At the same time, it is a show distinguished by its unblinking focus on the topic of death, which it explores on multiple levels (personal, religious, and philosophical). Each episode begins with a death — anything from drowning or heart attack to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome — and that death usually sets the tone for each episode, allowing the characters to reflect on their current fortunes and misfortunes in a way that is illuminated by the death and its aftermath. The show also has a strong dosage of dark humor and surrealism running throughout.
A recurring plot device consists of a character having an imaginary conversation with the deceased; for example, Nate, David, and Federico sometimes "converse" with the person who died at the beginning of the episode, while they are being embalmed or planning or during the funeral. Sometimes, the conversation is with other recurring deceased characters, most notably Nathaniel Fisher Sr. The show's creator Alan Ball states they represent the living character's internal dialogue by exposing it as an external conversation.
Although overall plots and characters were created by Alan Ball, there are conflicting reports on how the series was conceived. In one instance, Ball stated that he came up with the premise of the show after the deaths of his sister and father. However, in an interview,[14] he intimates that HBO entertainment president Carolyn Strauss proposed the idea to him. In a copyright-infringement lawsuit,[15] screenwriter Gwen O’Donnell asserted that she was the original source of the idea which later passed through Strauss to Ball; the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, proceeding on the assumption that this assertion was true, rejected her claim. Ball stated in an interview "When I went to HBO and they had read my first draft and Carolyn Strauss said, "You know, this is really, really good. I love these characters, I love these situations, but it feels a little safe. Could you just make it just a little more fucked up," which is not a note that you get in Hollywood very often. And I thought, "Wow!" And that gave me free range to go a little deeper, go a little darker, go a little more complicated".
The show focuses on human mortality and the lives of those who deal with it on a daily basis. When discussing the concept of the show, creator Alan Ball elaborates on the foremost questions the show’s pilot targeted:
| “ | Who are these people who are funeral directors that we hire to face death for us? What does that do to their own lives — to grow up in a home where there are dead bodies in the basement, to be a child and walk in on your father with a body lying on a table opened up and him working on it? What does that do to you?[14] | ” |
Six Feet Under introduces the Fisher family as the basis on which to explore these questions. Throughout its five-season, 63-episode run, major characters experience crises which are in direct relation to their environment and the grief they’ve experienced. Alan Ball again relates these experiences as well as the choice of the series’ title, to the persistent subtext of the program[16]:
| “ | Six Feet Under refers not only to being buried as a dead body is buried, but to primal emotions and feelings running under the surface. When one is surrounded by death — to counterbalance that, there needs to be a certain intensity of experience, of needing to escape. It’s Nate with his womanizing — it’s Claire and her sexual experimentation — it’s Brenda’s sexual compulsiveness — it’s David having sex with a male hooker in public — it’s Ruth having several affairs — it’s the life force trying to push up through all of that suffering and grief and depression. | ” |
As Shoshana and Teman suggest in their sociological analysis of the "life-self" and the "death-self" embodied by the members of the Fisher family, "The series hurls death provocatively in the viewer's face, each episode consciously serving as a "memento mori" for its audience. Consequently, death is starkly present within the life-world of the series, challenging the strict binary between life and death. The blurring of these boundaries evokes the idea that the living can be more lifeless than the physically deceased and the departed can be livelier than the living."[17]
| Actor | Character | Relationship |
|---|---|---|
| Peter Krause | Nathaniel Samuel "Nate" Fisher Jr. | Eldest son of Ruth and Nathaniel; co-operator of Fisher & Diaz. |
| Michael C. Hall | David James Fisher | Middle child of Ruth and Nathaniel; co-operator of Fisher & Diaz. |
| Frances Conroy | Ruth Fisher | Matriarch of Fisher family. |
| Lauren Ambrose | Claire Simone Fisher | Youngest child of Ruth and Nathaniel; artist of the family. |
| Freddy Rodriguez | Federico Diaz | Business partner and embalmer at Fisher & Diaz with Nate and David; husband of Vanessa. |
| Mathew St. Patrick | Keith Charles | Los Angeles police officer with a long-term relationship with David. |
| Rachel Griffiths | Brenda Chenowith | Daughter of Margaret and Bernard Chenowith; sister of Billy; on-again, off-again partner with Nate. |
| Actor | Character | Seasons | Relationship |
|---|---|---|---|
| Richard Jenkins | Nathaniel Samuel Fisher Sr. | 1–5 | Patriarch of Fisher family and owner of Fisher & Sons Funeral Home before his death in a car accident in 2000. Husband of Ruth; father of Nate, David and Claire. |
| Jeremy Sisto | Billy Chenowith | 1–5 | Brenda’s younger brother who has bipolar disorder; son of Margaret and Bernard Chenowith. |
| Justina Machado | Vanessa Diaz | 1–5 | Registered nurse; wife and high school sweetheart of Federico. |
| Joanna Cassidy | Margaret Chenowith | 1–5 | Psychologist mother of Brenda and Billy; wife of Bernard. |
| Patricia Clarkson | Sarah O’Connor | 2–5 | Younger sister of Ruth Fisher, an artist who lives in Topanga Canyon. |
| Eric Balfour | Gabriel Dimas | 1–3 | Claire’s high school boyfriend who was a chronic drug user. |
| Ed O'Ross | Nikolai | 1–2; 5 | Owner of Blossom d’Amour Flower Shop; boyfriend of Ruth Fisher when she worked as a florist. |
| Marina Black | Parker McKenna | 1–2 | A friend of Claire's during high school. |
| Robert Foxworth | Dr. Bernard Chenowith | 1–3 | Brenda and Billy’s psychiatrist father; husband to Margaret. |
| Gary Hershberger | Matthew Gilardi | 1–2 | Employer of a major funeral home organisation who attempts to buy out Fisher and Sons. |
| Ed Begley, Jr. | Hiram Gunderson | 1; 5 | Had an affair with Ruth Fisher while she was married to Nathaniel. |
| Lili Taylor | Lisa Kimmel Fisher | 2–5 | Nate’s former girlfriend and roommate while living in Seattle; she subsequently becomes involved again in his life. |
| Aysia Polk | Taylor | 2–3 | Keith's niece, who is under his care for season 2. |
| James Cromwell | George Sibley | 3–5 | Geologist/professor; second husband to Ruth. |
| Kathy Bates | Bettina | 3–5 | Sarah’s friend and caretaker who becomes a good friend of Ruth. |
| Peter Macdissi | Olivier Castro-Staal | 3–5 | Claire's Professor of Form and Space at LAC-Arts; lover to Margaret Chenowith. |
| Ben Foster | Russell Corwin | 3–5 | A friend of Claire's from at art school and one-time boyfriend. |
| Rainn Wilson | Arthur Martin | 3–5 | A young intern from Cypress College mortuary school who works for the funeral home briefly. |
| Sprague Grayden | Anita Miller | 3–5 | A friend of Claire's from art school. |
| Mena Suvari | Edie | 4 | Free spirited lesbian artist and friend of Claire's from art school. |
| Justin Theroux | Joe | 4 | Boyfriend of Brenda during season 4. |
| Tina Holmes | Maggie Sibley | 4–5 | Daughter of George Sibley. |
| Chris Messina | Ted Fairwell | 5 | Lawyer at Claire Fisher's temp. office job; boyfriend of Claire Fisher during season 5. |
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Nathaniel Fisher Sr. |
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Ruth Fisher |
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Bernard Chenowith |
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Margaret Chenowith |
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George Sibley |
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Unnamed prior wife |
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| Keith Charles |
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David Fisher |
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Claire Fisher |
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Nathaniel Fisher Jr. |
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Brenda Chenowith |
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Billy Chenowith |
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Lisa Kimmel Fisher |
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Maggie Sibley |
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Brian Sibley | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Anthony Charles-Fisher |
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Durrell Charles-Fisher |
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Willa Fisher Chenowith |
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Maya Fisher |
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The series' main theme, written by composer Thomas Newman, won an Emmy award for Outstanding Main Title Theme Music and Grammy awards for Best Instrumental Composition and Best Instrumental Arrangement for title theme.
The production sound from seasons 3 through 5 was mixed by Bo Harwood, and was nominated for a Cinema Audio Society Award.
The following songs were played during the teaser trailers for the seasons following the first:
The song played during each episode recaps in Seasons One and Two is a 1995 single called "Nothing Lies Still Long" by Pell Mell.
Previews for upcoming episodes feature the Six Feet Under theme. The first and fifth seasons feature the original version of the song while the second, third and fourth seasons feature the Rae & Christian remix.
All five seasons are available on DVD in individual box sets and in a collected volume.
| Season | Region 1 Release Date | Region 2 Release Date | Episodes | Discs | Bonus Features |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | February 4, 2003 | July 7, 2003 | 13 | 4 |
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| 2 | July 6, 2004 | June 21, 2004 | 13 | 5 |
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| 3 | May 17, 2005 | April 4, 2005 | 13 | 5 |
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| 4 | August 23, 2005 | September 5, 2005 | 12 | 5 |
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| 5 | March 28, 2006 | April 10, 2006 | 12 | 5 |
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Two soundtrack albums, featuring music that had appeared in the series, were released:
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Unfortunately, we could not find any sentences from other sites similar to those above.
  | Official website - HBO: Six Feet Under |
| | Six Feet Under: In Memoriam Interview - HBO.com: Video Player |
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