12 Things To Know About Parker Posey And Her Southern Roots

Parker Posey is currently stealing nearly every scene in the current season of The White Lotus, as she wanders through the luxury resort stressing out about massages in her naturally pitch-perfect Southern drawl.

While mainstream audiences may just be getting to know her, Posey has been a darling of Hollywood and the indie film scene for decades. She is known for indie classics such as Party Girl, Clockwatchers, The Daytrippers, The Doom Generation, Henry Fool, and The House of Yes among many, many other entries on her IMDB listing. She’s such a legend in that scene that Time magazine anointed her Queen of the Indies.

In The White Lotus, the wildly popular upstairs-downstairs thriller, Posey plays Victoria Ratliff, a wealthy Southern matriarch, married to Jason Isaacs’ Timothy Ratliff. Posey told The Hollywood Reporter about her character: “She’s spoiled, she’s very much a woman-child and a narcissist — a lot of that is due to her sensitivity and her wanting to escape, which she does through taking pills.”

She and Isaacs play parents to three children, Saxon (Patrick Schwarzenegger), Piper (Sarah Catherine Hook), and Lochlan (Sam Nivola). The Southern couple are vying for their youngest to either follow his father to Duke or in the footsteps of his mother to UNC at Chapel Hill, a mystery some viewers may be hoping will be resolved by the end of the season. 

Here are a few things to know about the Southern star: 

Parker Christian Posey was born on November 8, 1968 in Baltimore, Maryland, to mom Lynda Patton, a chef, and dad Chris Posey, who owned a car dealership. She has a fraternal twin brother, Christopher Posey. 

She Was Raised In The South

Like her The White Lotus character, she did grow up in the south, first in Monroe, Louisiana, where the family lived for over a decade, and later Laurel, Mississippi where she attended Laurel High School.

She also attended Strong River Camp and Farm in Pinola, Mississippi, as a child, where, as an eight-year-old, she put on “a version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears where Little Red Riding Hood was a detective,” according to an interview in Vogue. 

She Wanted To Be A Ballet Dancer

Posey studied ballet and traveled up to the North Carolina School of the Arts to train at their summer programs. In an interview with Harper’s Bazaar, she explained that when she was a 12-year-old, she auditioned to attend the competitive ballet department.

“I didn’t get in and I was devastated,” she told the magazine. “And my dad called the dean of the school. He said, ‘My daughter’s going to be really upset. What do I tell her?’ And the dean said, ‘Tell her she’s an actress.’” The dean was on to something! She got to operate her dance skills playing a club kid in the 1995 cult classic film Party Girl.

First Look Pictures/courtesy Everett Collection

She Studied Acting In College

Posey eventually left the South to go study drama at SUNY Purchase in upstate New York. According to Vogue, a talent agent saw Posey in a play on campus and took her on as a client sending her out to auditions for Broadway, theater, and films while she was still in school.

Her TV Debut Was On A Soap Opera

Less than three weeks before graduation, Posey dropped out of school after landing a role on As the World Turns, For her first major part, Posey had an eight-episode story arc playing Tess Shelby on the beloved soap opera, showing up to stir up a little drama in Oakdale.

CBS Photo Archive / Contributor/Getty Images

Her First Major Role Was In A Film Set In The South 

Parker’s breakthrough film role was playing Darla, a ruthless Texas teen hellbent on hazing the next class of high school students, in Dazed and Confused. The 1993 coming-of-age comedy by Richard Linklater not only brought Posey to our screens, but the film also introduced the world to a little star-in-the-making, Matthew McConaughey. Guess Linklater really does have an eye for talent!

Everett Collection

She Has Rom-Com Cred

Director Nora Ephron cast Posey in Sleepless in Seattle, but the part was eventually cut from the finished film. Ephron liked what she saw, though, and cast her as rollerblader in Mixed Nuts. Ephron then wrote a role in the 1998 classic You’ve Got Mail, with Posey in mind. She played Joe Fox’s (Tom Hanks) girlfriend, Patricia Eden, and while it’s challenging to compete with Meg Ryan, Posey delivered yet another memorable performance.

The Everett Collection

She Had Her Eye On Speed

Posey reportedly auditioned for the Sandra Bullock role in Speed, but got cut after grabbing a paper plate to operate as a steering wheel. (“Keanu laughed but the director didn’t,” per her telling of the story in Vogue.)

She And ‘White Lotus’ Star Jennifer Coolidge Have A Long History

While Posey’s and Jennifer Coolidge’s characters don’t cross paths on The White Lotus, the two actors have a very long cinematic history together. They both starred in director Christopher Guest’s satiric faux documentaries, including, Best in Show and A Mighty Wind.

She Waited 20 Years To Work With Mike White

Mike White, the creator of The White Lotus, was a huge fan of Posey’s early work and told her so. According to a story she told during an appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers, she told him that if he was a real fan, he would write a juicy part for her. Fast forward 20 years and she’s starring in his hit television show. “I was so excited,” she admitted about finally getting the scripts. “I read all eight episodes in one sitting and it was such a ride.”

©HBO / Courtesy Everett Collection

Her The White Lotus Accent Has Deep Southern Roots

Posey’s accent has become a water cooler discussion point (is it too much? Is it just right?) Posey grew up in Mississippi and comes by her accent honestly.

Fellow Mississippian Landon Bryant better known on Instagram as @landontalks, even made a post about it to fight the haters. “Parker Posey’s accent is correct in The White Lotus—is correct,” he said in a social media post. “She’s from my town. She’s from Laurel [Mississippi]. She went to Laurel High School. If you were to go to the Laurel Country Club, her mom and them all sound exactly like that. You hear how I sound? Kind of like cornbread. We’re from the same place.”

While that is all true, Posey admits that the accent is a little exaggerated with a touch of inspiration from elsewhere. She told Variety that it was inspired by her own Southern roots as well as a touch of The Official Preppy Handbook and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and, reportedly a seasons of Bravo’s Southern Charm.

She Is A Very Private Person

While her job puts her in the spotlight, Parker keeps her personal life very much off the radar. Little is known about her private life and relationships.

She’s A Dog Person

Rob Kim / Contributor/Getty Images

While she does tend to keep things about her life tranquil, according to a recent New York Times profile, apparently almost everyone in lower Manhattan can attest that Posey is very much a dog person. She greets dogs on walks and makes friends at the dog park.