Carrie Coon on His Three Daughters and the Healing Power of Grief

No one else sounds like Carrie Coon. With a deep, distinctive tenor that announces she takes no bullshit, the actor’s booming voice emerges from deep within the body; the words are clear and commanding, enough so that your ears could pick her out in a crowd. “I almost never get recognised,” says Coon, who, sat across from me, somehow speaks faster and more dramatically than she does on screen. “But sometimes people recognise my voice. They turn around and say, ‘Nora Durst?’ It’s only Leftovers fans who recognise me – and it’s for my voice.”

Coon, though, is being modest. An actor’s actor, the 43-year-old is the kind of performer who is highly regarded by peers and critics alike – and, with an upcoming role in season three of The White Lotus, is rightfully ascending in fame. First, there’s His Three Daughters, a film written by director Azazel Jacobs specifically for Coon, Elizabeth Olsen and Natasha Lyonne, who excel in an ensemble that takes advantage of their contrasting voices. When Coon’s stern enunciation clashes with Lyonne’s gravelly groan, Olsen’s dulcet tones fill the gap. “Aza was thinking of the way we sound,” says Coon. “He directed it musically. He punctuated it musically. There’s no improvisation.”

Set almost entirely in a claustrophobic Brooklyn flat, His Three Daughters follows a trio of estranged siblings who reunite to care for their dying father. Establishing the drama’s urgent, wordy tone, Katie (Coon) kicks off the film with a lengthy screed about death-related admin. Rachel (Lyonne), a perpetual weed smoker, is more concerned about watching sports, while Christina (Olsen) emerges as a reluctant peacemaker. These dynamics, though, are temporary. “We feel like stereotypes at the beginning because we’re performing our roles as sister for each other, in the way our sisters see us,” says Coon. “Katie is hard and abrasive in that opening scene. I knew it’d just be me against a white wall, without cutting away to the other actors. It’s a monologue I prepared for like a play. It was nerve-wracking.”

Then again, Coon, who was nominated for a Tony in 2013 for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, is exactly who you’d want for a monologue. As Nora in The Leftovers, she delivered one of the medium’s defining moments in the finale, speaking for minutes as the camera zooms in on her face. With her Emmy-nominated turn in Fargo, she cemented what she jokes is “a reputation for closing the deal with a monologue”. It’s The Leftovers that’s defined the NYC-based actor’s career to date, despite noteworthy roles in the likes of Gone Girl and Sean Durkin’s The Nest, opposite Jude Law. “Because of The Leftovers people often send me scripts with grieving mothers,” she says. “His Three Daughters isn’t too far from that – it’s certainly a piece about grief.” She thinks about it some more. “Grieving is a shared experience. Art is often about death. It may not be particular to me. Maybe it’s particular to art in general because it’s particular to the human experience.”

Born in Ohio, Coon developed her literal voice upon entering the industry with the help of a coach. “I started to understand that I’d never really taken a deep breath,” she recalls. “It’s common in America that we’re head-forward and disconnected from our bodies. I was an athlete, so I had access to my body, but I never understood the way my breath integrated all those parts.” For each role, she alters how the words come out. “When you understand the way that works mechanically, you have the opportunity to make choices about what your voice is doing. That was the first time I understood how much power that gives you.”

It was on Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? that Coon met her husband, Tracy Letts, with whom she now has two children. That Broadway run also led to life-changing auditions for The Leftovers and Gone Girl. More recently, she believes her theatre background is why she was offered The Gilded Age, an HBO drama for which she’s been nominated for best actress at this year’s Emmys. “When you’re on stage, there’s nowhere to hide. You’re telling the story with your whole body, and on The Gilded Age the language is heightened. All the people on our show are Broadway actors.”

Coon, though, disagrees with critics who refer to His Three Daughters as being like a play, even if the story is driven by dialogue. “There are equal amounts of quietness and stillness because Aza is a filmmaker, ultimately, not a theatre director,” she says. “The space and the women are presented one way, and when the film ends you see them in a different way.” Coo was especially taken by the film’s treatment of time passing – or, rather, how it doesn’t – in the midst of grief. “When you’re waiting for a loved one to die and you’re sharing a space, time becomes very out of proportion. Things you would have done fast, you do more slowly. You’re stepping out of the rhythms of your life.”

As for whether Coon will play another grieving mother in The White Lotus, she can neither confirm nor deny. Viewers will, at least, recognise her voice, even among the gigantic ensemble. “I started off doing Shakespeare in a 1,100-seat house, and it was hard for my body to fill the space,” she says. “I worked with a couple of voice teachers to find ease in filling those spaces truthfully without having to shout something really specific. A lot of young actors are missing out on this kind of vocal work because they’re not coming up through theatre any more. It’s important for me to help young actors understand – or even women in a room – how much power you’re giving up if your voice isn’t rooted in the body.”

Coon believes it’s important to study her own work. One aspect she hopes to develop in the future is her depiction of anger. “I’m always holding tension in a particular way,” she says. “Is there another way?” With regards to future roles, she’s hoping for more comedy, or at least for more characters who aren’t grappling with death. Still, she knows it’s a talent of hers. “My hallmark is these intense, dark, brooding, grieving, crazy women,” she jokes. “In my family, I don’t occur to anyone that way. They find my career very mysterious because I’m actually quite light-hearted. I have a lightness of being. But I am grieving the world, like everyone.”

His Three Daughters is in select UK cinemas now and on Netflix from 20th September.