David James Fisher is a fictional character played by Michael C. Hall on the HBO television series Six Feet Under.

His most significant challenges are related to keeping his funeral home in business, navigating his relationship with Keith Charles, surviving being carjacked, and coping with the death of his father.

Michael C. Hall was widely praised for his portrayal of the character, and was nominated for and won major awards as a result.

[5] However, director Sam Mendes had just finished working with Hall on the Broadway show Cabaret and called him one day at noon to invite him to audition for the role that evening.

[6] Ball (who had worked with Mendes on the film American Beauty) said that, after four days of auditions "[Hall] started reading, and I just saw the character come to life.

Some years prior to the pilot episode, David abandoned his desire to become a lawyer and instead, went to mortuary school to assist his father with the business.

Although he began to suspect he was gay in childhood, Season 3 reveals that he spent "ten years" dating women,[9] going as far as getting engaged to a woman named Jennifer Mason.

[10] His anger is complicated when a major funeral home chain called Kroehner Service International, harasses the brothers to sell to them.

In the wake of their break-up, David is offered and accepts his father's deacon position at the Episcopalian Church while secretly engaging in a series of one-night stands and risky sex.

[1] His mother accepts him, but he is asked to resign as deacon, while the Fisher family in turn leave the church in solidarity with David.

David tolerates his behavior until an argument about attending Claire's graduation turns violent and erupts into the two men grappling on the floor before engaging in rough sex that leaves both of them slightly injured.

[23] When one of the paintball players (named Sarge) is too inebriated to drive home, he stays over, which leads to the men having a three-way sexual experience.

[25] The incident coincides with the disappearance of Nate's wife, Lisa, and David stays with his brother for a time while avoiding Keith.

[27] In the season premiere, after a hard night, Nate tells his family that a body that washed ashore has been identified as Lisa's.

[31] While Keith is away, David is kidnapped at gunpoint by a hitchhiker he picks up en route to delivering a dead body to the funeral home.

[31] The carjacker robs David, makes him smoke crack cocaine, beats him, and finally douses him in gasoline and puts a gun in his mouth, forcing him to beg for his life.

David grows increasingly lonely and emotionally unhinged, starts drinking more and tearfully tells Keith that he wants them to become sexually exclusive.

[41] After a brief stay with his mother, he and Keith pool their savings to purchase the shares of Fisher & Diaz owned by Brenda and Rico.

[42] Between the series finale, "Everyone's Waiting", and the obituaries published at the official HBO website,[42][43] the viewers learn of David's life after the show up until his death.

[42][c] David retires from Fisher & Sons in 2034 (Durrell continues the business),[43] and goes on to star in many local community theater productions.

"[44] Sally Munt, in her book Queer Attachments: The Cultural Politics of Shame, said, "For the first time in mass broadcasting, gay David is the 'everyman' whose quest for love and self-acceptance inculcates the viewer.

"[45] In reference to the scene when David comes out to his mother, Queer TV: Theories, Histories, Politics commented that it "purposefully counters the predictability of most coming out scenes in film and television texts, in which a bold declaration is followed swiftly by angry rejection or emotional acceptance.

One Temple University publication purported that "Six Feet Under offers a critique of bourgeois selfhood through the gay heroic figure of David Fisher and his psychic states are represented as a logical outcome of his homosexual middle-class identity.

In addition, he shared in the Screen Actors Guild nominations for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series all five years that the show was in production, winning the award in 2003 and 2004.