Jill Clayburgh, multiple Academy Award nominee, plays Letitia Darling, elegant wife and mother of the Darling clan. According to the showrunners, she has some possibly sexy secrets of her own. The promos reveal little except that she has a killer wardrobe and a deadly hand when it comes to smashing large vases...

The spoiler on this is that she had a longstanding affair with Nick's father, but no one knows whether her husband knew about it.

I so love Jill Clayburgh, I can't even say. Fine singing voice in her stage musicals like Pippin, early "wow who is that can we see more of her?" movie roles (The Thief Who Came To Dinner), major movie star roles (Gable and Lombard, An Unmarried Woman, Starting Over), settling into a TV guest-and-movie career, starting to play "glamorous mothers of adults" in movies and TV (Fools Rush In, Ally McBeal), and in the last couple of years major Broadway roles again. She's kept it going, and good for her. I've always thought her very beautiful, and at the same rather offbeat and distinctive-looking. I still do. She's nearly enough to tempt me to watch this, all by herself.

Interesting Sept. 23rd interview in Playbill with Ms. Clayburgh on the differences in working in movies, theatre, and television. (Includes some minor spoilers.)

Jill Clayburgh did not have much to do tonight, really, but I bet that in some upcoming episodes she will get to shine as I know she can do.

I've loved Jill for many years and was thrilled to see she's on this show. I thought she was terrific last night . . . especially her reaction to the horse. (A horse in a Park Ave. coop?? Yikes!)

Girl has had some work done but it's pretty good as compared to some others of her generation. (Dyan Cannon, I'm looking at you!!)

Jill Clayburgh is still beautiful [and yes, I agree, her work has been discreet and appropriate], and still a wonderful actress. Her brief moments shone.

I don't think I have seen Jill in anything bad. She is one of the best, and most under utilized actresses out there.

To this day the only thing I can think when I see her is Gene Wilder's "son of a bitch!" from Silver Streak. That's just the only one of her roles that's stuck with me for some reason.

Jill had a few scenes but in those few scenes she really has shone and marked her role in the show. She was subtle but powerful.

She did, and funny too. I was amused her entrance with the dramatic veil and the 'I wish I was dead' line (or something like that, anyway).

60 Seconds with Jill Clayburgh

I can't believe no one has commented on the last few episodes. Her confessing her adultery and her hope that Tripp would love Dutch's child anyway.... wow...

I love the way the 2 of them play off each other...

I thought her outfit with the glasses in the sliver polishing scene was really cute. And I am 20 and now feel old for saying so.

Totally agree Wine2Much. They play off each other so well. Good tennis.

Till now I've been confusing her with Susan Sullivan. D'oh.

On another thread, before the show even premiered, I opined that in the previews - during the vase drop - she totally looked like Susan Sullivan in Kitty Montgomery/"Dharma and Greg" mode - so don't feel badly.

I actually came in here because I wanted to see if anybody else thought that Tish killed Dutch. I am not sure why I think that I just do. I was actually typing a post about the Oct 31 episode and the thought just came to me. Ok ...... so just me. Maybe the evil monkey in my closet is right and I have lost my mind. Never mind moving along.

Tish as the killer of Dutch! Interesting!

One of the things I love about this show is that I find the character interactions so fascinating, I really, even more than usual, do not care where they take the plot. Whoever killed Dutch, whoever are not Tripp's children,, I do not so much care about the answers, but more about how they justify those answers. The minds that justify in this show really intrigue me.

The fact that people here theorize about all sorts of plot possibilities, most of which never occurred to me, richens (richifies?) the pot/potential plot.

It has been my personal theory since the pilot that Tish is the one who killed Dutch but I'm wary. This show is already compared to AD quite a bit and do they really need another similarity?(I apologize if no one has seen AD yet and I spoiled you a bit).
Glad to see there is another out there whose evil monkey tells them they've lost their mind too.

The Tish killed Dutch theory is interesting...but I'm having trouble imagining what would have motivated her to do it.

I agree...and I thank the writers/creators for coming up with characters that are complex enough that there are all sorts of plot possibilities that are plausible (sorry, I had fun with that that aliteration)

There's definitely more to Tish that meets the eye. Her comment to Nick about Tripp losing the world's largest emerald...that was well done and fun. But if her character began and ended there (like it would have on any number of previous nighttime soaps) she'd bore me to tears. The fact that the same character appears in so much pain over the loss of her love, and the distance between her and her husband, while at the same time warmly welcoming her son and illegitimate grandson into her home and cautioning her daughter about repeating her mistakes...well, it's characterizations like that which make the show interesting to me.

All that being said, I have to say I really didn't understand what was going on between Tish and Nick in their scene toward the end of the episode. I got the 'I'm sad Tripp doesn't have the same nostalgia for Darling Plaza that I do, and it's probably my fault' part of it...but then she seemed to just go on in a way that didn't make sense to me. Any ideas on what she was getting at? or what was going on in that scene?

I love Jill Clayburgh in this role, she's such a versatile actress. I was watching Running with Scissors the other night and she was in it and she played such a grotesque but sweet character and the role really hid her beauty. It took me a good minute to realize it was really her. For 63 she looks pretty great.

For some reason Tish doesn't really seem as pompous and show-offy about her wealth as I would've thought. She seems very down to earth and private as opposed to Nora Walker the matriarch on Brothers & Sisters who despite being warm likes to delve into her children's lives a little more than expected. Tish knows when to involve herself and when not to. I'm glad she had some sort of backstory with Dutch because she would seem very bland if she didn't.

I was really surprised in ep 5 when she told Nick that deciding things like massive frivolous spending on the kids' part was something she and Tripp left up to Dutch.

I think Jill Clayburgh is a wonderful actress. She certainly gets Tish well. She radiates beauty and classiness, just how her character is supposed to be. On last night's episode (The Watch), I noticed her eye language when telling Nick, "Brian is your brother." It was so touchy, there's relief and sadness in there. It's just appropriate that Entertainment Weekly named her Hollywood's 25 Greatest Actresses (back in 1999). She better be nominated for at least one Emmy for this role!

Does no one else think that Jill Clayburgh is ematiated to the point of looking scary? Like skin stretched over a skeleton. She looks like she is either anorexic or seriously ill. I almost have to look away during her close-ups.
Okay, maybe just me then.

prosaic, I too think Jill is a bit too thin. She's still really beautiful though... just could use some extra pounds.

'The Watch' would be a really good episode for her.

I can't say that I haven't noticed (woah, double negative) that she does look really quite gaunt. I didn't know if it was a lack of make-up or whatever because they do often put her in those quivery-voice scenes where the look is more fitting I suppose but she often doesn't look her best.

A little slow on the uptake here in identifying Jill Clayburgh (oh, well). Last night I was watching a re-run and noticed how well she managed to describe her love of Dutch and her love of Tripp. With respect to Tripp, the line, "I love him, too" could have come across as either maudlin or not believable -- that is, be selfishness parading as love -- in the hands of a lesser actress. Hat's off to her, and I, too, want to see more.

So my relatives keep sending me photos from Christmas. Every photo taken of me also features a glass of wine and I look like Letitia Darling, 30 years younger with a much lower wardrobe budget. It's freaking me out.

She doesn't look well. And, in this role, I'm not a fan of her acting. Some of it is a little over the top for me.