Jason Clarke on His Shocking Alex Murdaugh Transformation for ‘Death in the Family’ (Exclusive)

The Murdaugh family murder case captivated the country, and at the center was patriarch Alex Murdaugh.

Alex was accused of murdering his wife Margaret and son Paul, but the investigation would lead to other scandals and conspiracies and spawn documentaries, specials, podcast, and now a new drama series.

“Murdaugh: Death in the Family” is the true crime story of an elite and deadly South Carolina dynasty that dominated the headlines as it unraveled in real time.

The Murdaughs were a powerful family of lawyers who would do anything to protect their reputation, and Alex was later convicted of the Margaret and Paul’s killings. At the time of his death, Paul was facing 25 years in prison for killing a friend in a drunken boat accident.

Alex was also convicted of fraud and money laundering, stealing millions from his law firm as he reportedly spent $50,000 per week on his opioid addiction.

In “Murdaugh: Death in the Family,” Jason Clarke is the patriarch, who is currently serving two life sentences, and Oscar and Emmy winner Patricia Arquette plays his wife Maggie. 

“Extra’s” Mona Kosar Abdi caught up with the stars, and Jason opened up about how committed he was to the role.

Clarke said of playing Alex, “He was a big, massive, tall redhead. He was a lawyer. He was a victim in his own mind. You know, he was a drug addict… and I just worked so hard to do it properly that you find yourself there and you find yourself looking in the mirror in your trailer just going, ‘Oh, my God, look at me.’”

He went on, “I wore tracksuit pants for six months, I put on 40 lbs.…. but it puts you in that park to play, you know what I mean?”

Clarke got a little surprise from hair and makeup when they dyed his eyebrows red without warning. Clarke said, “It was just like boom… and you go, ‘Well, the train is on the track, there is no going back!’”

Jason also recalled his disbelief when he learned about the case, saying, “I just watched it from afar and you saw it unfold and keep unfolding and keep unfolding and then you just came back to… His son? His wife? How does that happen?”

Patricia talked about playing Margaret, saying, “I feel like she came up at a time and a certain part of the country where a lot of things were normalized. It’s like, ‘Oh, he's drunk… but he's a good boy, he's naughty...he’s just getting away with stuff.’”

Arquette added, “There's a lot of normalizing, not normal behavior. There's a lot of lies. There's a lot of deception. There's a lot of manipulation. So, I wanted to really show someone whose values were like being a mom, being a wife, trying to stick it out and then the slow discovery of, like, what is this and what is that and how many things don't I know and what's happening and who am I with?”

Brittany Snow plays intrepid reporter Mandy Matney, who broke the case wide open and executive produced the new series.

Snow confessed, “I was a superfan of [Mandy]. I am so familiar, I have done so much research, and I know exactly how Mandy is.”

Matney shared of her story, “I basically started investigating the Murdaugh family seven years ago now… To look back on that when I was a local reporter just pulling on strings… Now I’m in New York City in a press junket with Brittany Snow... It's a dream come true.”