Patricia Scanlon's remarkable portrayal of Paula Pepperell, the earnest and enigmatic Union Rep, on HBO's acclaimed series Getting On has garnered widespread critical acclaim.
Born in a small town in Massachusetts, Scanlon spent her youth working on her Grandmother's horse ranch in nearby Holliston, Massachusetts. She later attended the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she studied acting with renowned actor Bill Pullman.
Scanlon's solo show, Another Cup of Coffee, has been performed at numerous prestigious venues, including Home For Contemporary Theater and Art in New York, The Public Theater, Lincoln Center, and the inaugural Lucille Ball Festival in Jamestown, Massachusetts. Her performance in Blaming Mom by David Edelstein at the Ohio Theater in New York earned critical accolades, with Ben Brantley noting that Scanlon, as a "cripplingly high-strung femme fatale," provided one of the season's comic high points.
Scanlon has performed in numerous plays in New York and Los Angeles, and her play What Is This Everything? is published by Smith and Kraus. Her episodic theater serial, Hildy Hildy, which she penned and starred in, developed a cult following and ran to sold-out audiences for three seasons at the Cucaracha Theater in New York. The show was later produced as a play at Soho Rep in New York, where Scanlon co-starred alongside John C. Reilly, and then moved to Los Angeles, where it ran at the Bootleg Theater for three seasons.
Material from Hildy Hildy was later produced as the play Three Feet Under, presented by Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner. The show attracted a range of notable co-stars, including Laurie Metcalf, Jane Lynch, Martin Donovan, Kevin Corrigan, Elizabeth Berridge, Blue Man Group, Siobhan Fallon, Tim Blake Nelson, and others. The show was later animated by Disney animator Dan Lund and picked up for development by TBS.
In addition to her work on Hildy Hildy, Scanlon wrote and performed in her play Death of a Salesgirl at the Bootleg Theater in Los Angeles. Ovation recommended, Death of a Salesgirl was one of the top ten critically acclaimed theatrical productions in Los Angeles, and garnered seven LA Weekly Award Nominations, including Best Two-Person Performance and Best Production of the Year.
