When Brothers & Sisters debuted on ABC, Sally Field's family matriarch, Nora Walker, was at the center of the action: Her husband, business mogul William Walker (Tom Skerritt), had an unexpected heart attack during a family gathering and died suddenly in the series' debut episode, and Nora was forced to deal with the severe repercussions, including sudden knowledge of his secret financial improprieties, as well as his long-term mistress and their grown daughter. But now that the series is into its second season, Nora is less of a progenitor of its action. Instead, she has become the glue that holds it together: the character around whom the various plot lines revolve, as her children either come to her for advice or have it forced upon them.
This, however, hasn't deterred Field from making Nora as complex and interesting as any of her progeny. She is a walking series of contradictions: loving and nurturing yet harsh and judgmental, highly intelligent yet lacking in self-knowledge, mature and thoughtful yet compulsive and undisciplined, strong and independent yet willing to play the helpless widow from whom bad news must be hidden. The success of Field's portrayal comes from her ability to play each facet fully and truthfully, never sugarcoating the negative or italicizing the good. What emerges is an original and layered woman we can't help but like, even when she is behaving impossibly or uncharacteristically—as when Nora and an old friend from her hippie days, played by Margot Kidder, get arrested for smoking pot in Nora's car.
The foundation of Field's work is her innately sympathetic persona. It is impossible to imagine Betty Buckley, a fine yet more aggressive actor who played the role in the unaired pilot, making Nora Walker into the fascinating woman Field has found.
For this role, Sally Field won an Emmy Award in 2007 and is nominated for a Golden Globe. She was nominated for a SAG Award for "Forrest Gump" in 1995, for "A Woman of Independent Means" in 1996, for "A Cooler Climate" in 2000, and for "ER" and "David Copperfield" in 2001.
—Erik Haagensen