Meet the New Addition to True Blood Charcter

Lauren Bowles would love to talk about her debut tomorrow night on "True Blood." But she can't -- at least not in detail. HBO is that serious about clamping down on its hottest show since "The Sopranos."

"It's no joke. For the first time [in my career] I signed a confidentiality agreement," Bowles says. "I can't even confirm I have the job."

Bowles, the half-sister of "Seinfeld" and "Old Christine" star Julia Louis-Dreyfus, can say that she plays Holly Cleary, the new waitress at Merlotte's, the bar & grill which employs series protagonist Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin) on the supernaturally flavored series (in which vampires and humans mix freely in the Louisiana town of Bon Temps).

Holly, a single mother of two, befriends fellow waitress Arlene (Carrie Preston) and "has some interesting abilities that will develop as the show goes on," Bowles says coyly. "She's sort of warm-hearted but very grounded."

Holly will appear in this season's final four episodes (the season finale airs Sept. 12) -- and will return for "True Blood's" fourth season, which begins filming later this fall.
Bowles says she's always been a huge admirer of series creator Alan Ball ("American Beauty," "Six Feet Under"), who adapted "True Blood" from a series of Charlene Harris novels ("The Southern Vampire Mysteries").

"When I went in for the audition I wasn't even thinking about getting the job," she says. "I just wanted to do a really good job so [Ball] would think I was good and I could come back for something else."
Bowles, who's married to actor Patrick Fischler ("Lost," "Mad Men"), made several appearances on "Seinfeld" -- "100 percent nepotism, for sure," she says -- played Louis-Dreyfus' sister on the short-lived "Watching Ellie" and guest-starred on "Old Christine."

"People in TV always look like they're siblings, but we have different dads," she says. "Julia has a short, Frenchman dad and I have a tall, WASP-y dad.

"Our coloring throws people off, but our facial structures are very much our mom's."