Frances Conroy's Eye Injury Got Her An Iconic Role In 'American Horror Story'

Mar 20, 2023

Frances Conroy is a seasoned and well-respected actress known for her work on critically-lauded and award-winning TV shows like "Six Feet Under" and "American Horror Story," where she was specifically cast in the role of Moira O'Hara, an iconic TV character, because of her eye injury.

Conroy, born in Georgia in 1953, established a stage career and toured with a theater company since the 1970s. After moving to New York to study drama at the Julliard School, Conroy was a headliner with The Acting Company. 

Her first try at a movie role was in the classic Woody Allen film, "Manhattan," in 1979. She also landed supporting roles in films like "Scent of a Woman" and "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels,” but she loved the stage so much that it was her main medium. 

However, in 2001, Conroy took a shot at working on TV and became a fan favorite for playing the role of Ruth Fisher, an unhinged matriarch in "Six Feet Under." The show ran for five seasons and was regarded as prestige television on HBO. Conroy earned four Emmy nominations and several Golden Globes and Screen Actors Guild awards for her performance in this series. 

She also appeared as a recurring guest star on the sitcom “How I Met Your Mother.” However, it was her role as Moira on "American Horror Story" that sealed Conroy's status as a cult favorite among the fans. As a result of her convincing and scary performance, Conroy was subsequently asked to return to the anthology show, playing different characters at least seven more times. She reprised playing Moira in the series in 2018.

While casting for "American Horror Story" in 2011, Conroy explained to TV executives during the casting session that she had an eye problem. She thought she could wear contact lenses, as she was used to doing, so her eye injury would not look odd on the screen.

Conroy was reportedly in a car crash in the 1990s and incurred trauma to her face. Despite undergoing surgery, the accident damaged her cornea, so it looked like she had a glass eye. The truth was the scarring post-surgery made her injured eye lighter in color. Fortunately, Conroy doesn't have any vision problems and can still see perfectly fine. 

Showrunner Ryan Murphy and the writers, however, told Conroy not to hide the eye injury with contact lenses. Instead, they created Moira's character background based on this. They wrote into the script that her freaky character was shot in the eye and died as a result. 

Despite her eye injury, fans embraced Conroy's "quirks" and natural beauty more than anything. 

"Conroy is one of my absolute favorite actresses and seeing how her eye makes her so beautifully unique has really helped me in accepting my own difference as something cool and unique!" a fan with an eye injury wrote on Reddit. 

"Frances Conroy is beautiful and I honestly never noticed her eye before, but seeing it now just makes her face even more special and distinct," another fan said. 

“The way she acts it’s like you’re watching completely different people! You forget the actor entirely and only see the character she’s portraying, that’s quite a talent," a fan said in another Reddit thread celebrating Conroy's artistry. 

Are you also a fan of Frances Conroy? What character is your favorite? Did you ever notice her eye? Tell us what you think of the actress, and pass this story along to another fan!