LOS ANGELES • From the stars to the producers to the executives, no one involved with The People V. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story seemed to realise the significance of where they were celebrating their triumphant Emmy night after the awards ceremony on Sunday.

They were all at an after-party at an event space called Vibiana, about two blocks from the courthouse where the Simpson case was tried.

A couple of decades later, it was recreated on this FX show, which won the Emmy for Best Limited Series.

One person understood the odd coincidence of ending up back where it all started, after a circuitous and sometimes torturous route.

"I know where I am," Ms Marcia Clark, the prosecutor in the Simpson case, said gravely.

She was sitting on a couch, inches away from actress Sarah Paulson, who was holding the Emmy she won for portraying Ms Clark.

Ms Clark, who was Paulson's guest at the Emmys, said she could not help but think about how near the courthouse was on the ride over from the ceremony.

It was a bitter reminder for her - she was ridiculed in the news media in the mid-1990s, the perception being that she had blown the prosecution and let Simpson go free.

She has found her public comeback only in the last year, after the explosive popularity of the series and the sympathetic portrayal from Paulson, who, in her acceptance speech for her actress award, offered up a moving public apology to Ms Clark.

"The world saw me in sound bites," Ms Clark said. "Now I feel like I'm more understood."

As Ryan Murphy, the prolific television producer who shepherded this show, put it: "The great story tonight is Marcia Clark finally won."

NYTIMES