October 9, 2025 • 53 mins
Country singer Deacon Claybourne is on the pod!
"Nashville's" leading man, Charles Esten, joins Jenna and Kevin to talk about his time on the hit show, but his journey to get there could be its own TV series! From doing stand-up comedy, being the house manager at The Groundlings, to playing Buddy Holly in London and performing in front of royalty and U.S. Presidents! Plus, his funny audition story for "Nashville" and why it pays to be nice, his first unexpected encounter with Hayden Panettiere, performing at the Grand Ole Opry and The Bluebird Cafe as Deacon and then as himself, and his Guinness World Record! Strap on your boots and get ready for one heck of an adventure!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
And that's what you really missed with Jenna.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
And Kevin An iHeartRadio podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Welcome to you, and That's what you really miss podcast.
Oh my gosh, Oh my gosh, Oh my gosh. We
have Charles Auston here today from I mean, I want
to say from Nashville, but he's not from Nashville.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
He's from everything. He's from the industry, everything you've ever seen,
from stand.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Up comedy to Who's On is in any way improv
to the groundlings, to Nashville to the World Guinness World
Book of Records, to the Grand Old Lobbry, to a
family man and Outer.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Banks, I mean the naming.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
He's done it so truly. I am the man doesn't
need an introduction. But we have Charlal Duston here today,
and we hope you guys enjoyed this conversation.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
We talked about it all.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Shares some Nashville insight with us. His whole career has
just been completely insane. Oh buddy, Holly, pretty Holly, and
on the West end. I mean, it's just and needs
a lot of full circles.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
So wild. He's tapped into something. This story. The amount
of times I got goosebumps hearing his stories. I know,
I know, but hear from the man himself.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Hey good, how are you?
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Thanks for having me?
Speaker 2 (01:22):
This is an honor. Let me tell you. So we
finished watching Glee and we're watching all these musical TV
shows and movies. And I hadn't seen Nashville until last
week because it was on during Glee. I don't know
if I had some type of complex about it. I
don't know what it was. Oh, you better believe I'm
(01:44):
binge watching it.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
I I get it. So we'll get into this. Charles,
you have You have the craziest career wild Yeah. I
think the only person to have never been typecast. You
played everything. You've done everything. There's nothing you can't do.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
I okay, fair enough.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
No you can do it? No, no, no, I don't believe that.
I believe if you were presented with the challenge you
could do it.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
You could do it.
Speaker 4 (02:18):
Well. Ask the Broadway director that fired me.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
I think that's a director's problem. We just watched Nashville. Obviously,
there's so much crossover between Glee and Nashville and the
way how we felt doing a musical show, how it
connects with fans. How did you come to be on Nashville.
(02:44):
What was this experience, well.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
Person of Allly before that, I think you're absolutely right.
I think the business always has to be shown something
can work a lot of times before they say, okay,
we'll give it a shot. And Glee showed just how
it could work and how you know, you could sing
and act and it would take the scene to another
(03:07):
place to bear. Smash was on before us as well,
so they also showed it in that way, and I
think both of those things opened up the door for this.
Having said that, I know that the producers. Steve Buchanan
is an incredible guy here in Nashville who there's three
main places in Nashville. You got the Ryman Auditorium where
(03:30):
the Grand Old Opera used to be when it got
You have the New Opry House and the Bluebird Cafe,
and Steve was ran two of them. He ran the Ryman.
He was had a lot to do with the renovation
of the Rhymen and bringing it back to its former glory,
and he had a lot to do with the Grand
Old Opry. He did that for a number of years,
and he had had this germ of an idea of
(03:52):
what would it be like to be backstage at the Opry.
I can tell you now I get to play it
again this coming month and one eighty seventh time. Oh
the reason I say that, besides just the absolutely bred
as he said, is to tell you he was right.
It's really First of all, it's an amazing show, but
(04:13):
backstage it's so interesting and it's so cool. Eventually he
got that idea and Callie Curry oscar Winning Kelly currya.
She wrote Thoma and Luis. She is the one that
came up with all these incredible characters. I just think of.
You know so often you're not there for the most
important days of your life. I wasn't there when Callie
(04:34):
Curry thought up a guy named Deacon Claiborne. Yeah, but
she thought up all these characters, and along with she
and R. J. Cutler, who was one of the original
producers and the original director of the pilot, they started
casting this thing. Now, as you said, I've been in
the business a long time and I've done this, and
I've done that and the other. And I'd have to
say that again and again. I got to be in
(04:57):
some really cool projects. But to be the bang on
lead of something I just kept getting beat out, just
run finish line like I always the other guy that
almost got at And so I remember thinking, well, you
know what, I've been playing music longer than i've been acting,
and I was in a bandoned college before I went
to LA. Maybe I got a shot at this one
(05:19):
because of this other skill I got. But I have
to say it took a long time. I mean, we
could have a whole podcast just about that audition process.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
The only auditions did you have to do?
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Oh gosh, I'm gonna say more than at least five wow,
And yeah yeah, and I was, by the way, I
was the last piece of the puzzle. Wow. One funny
audition story real quickly is that. And I've always found this,
I don't know if you've ever found this, that the
projects that have that magic about them, like thinks of
(05:53):
the lap a little as my mom calls them, God incidents,
is things like that. Years ago, I was on a
show called who Line Is It Anyway?
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Which is crazy because and you're incredible on that show. Yeah, yeah,
wild different, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:10):
I was. I was a lot younger. I was chip.
I was making things up off the top of my
head with those incredible castmates of mine, I would leave
that show. I remember one day driving home because we
would do like a long like three three and a
half hours showing a live audience, and from that you
would make another number of episodes. I remember driving home
(06:31):
going why did my face hurt so much? And then
I ranting like an idiot?
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Yes a half hours and also you know, thank.
Speaker 4 (06:43):
You, and any about What I wanted to say was
I got the audition for to play Deacon, and I
look at the thing to go huh, and I realized
it was on the same lot, it was in the
same building. It was on the same floor that my
dressing room was in when I did whose line is
it anyway? Wow, that feels like a little bit of
(07:05):
And so I remember going in there and I did
I think two songs, one song and two scenes, and
I remember by them being very comfortable. I think if
I had been even a couple of years younger, I
wouldn't have been able to play a guy named Deacon
who'd seen about it. You can't be nervous when you're
auditioning for Deacon, because you can't chip I'm a little
(07:27):
bit of a lean forward on my seat. What do
you want me to be? What do you want me
to do? Guy? But Deacon is Deacon is this guy? Like,
by the way, I wore my Deacon down them just
for the love and anyway, So I'm in that room
and uh. I finished with the songs. And as I finished,
I walk out the door. I opened the door and
(07:48):
I bumped the door bumps into Hayden Panettier, who had
been dropping at the door. And she's like, and she
was so complimentary and so kind, and we never met.
I was a big fan already from Save the Cheerleader,
Saved the World from here, yeah, and from Remember the Titans, which,
(08:09):
of course that was the high school I went to.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
Oh wow, I played on.
Speaker 4 (08:15):
That football football team.
Speaker 5 (08:16):
So yeah, and I remember I said a few words
back and forth with her, and right as we were leaving,
I said, well, i'll see on the set, and I'll
never forget first day on the set.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
She walks up, she goes, I'll see on the set.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
That must have felt nice.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
And you did get the leading man gig.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Yeah, he did play that guy. It was really amazing.
It's also funny to me or interesting. There was never
a chemistry read with Connie. With Connie Brittain, so really
a little bit of a dice roll is there is there? There?
There is there anything?
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Five auditions and they didn't think to do a chemistry test.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
Yeah, I guess, I don't know. I mean it was
the last pieced doing other things, but wow, it ended
up working out. Yeah. I mean, I was again already
a huge fan of hers. Friday Night Lights was one
of those shows. You know those shows you watch and
you hit pause and say to the person, I just
want to do a show.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Oh yeah, you know what I mean, Yeah, totally.
Speaker 4 (09:23):
The more people that are with us that have to listen, Yeah,
can I just watched Friday Night.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
You don't understand. This doesn't happen very often.
Speaker 4 (09:34):
So I did that. So when I met Connie, I
walked right up to and I said, there's a million
reasons why I'm excited to do the show, and you
are a couple hundred of them. We got along like that,
and I remember those early scenes where we were both like,
this might work, there might be something.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
I think that that's a testament to, you know, the
production team and casting. I think we had a similar
experience where none of us had done any chemistry reads
about we auditioned. I think four times. I audition four times.
And so if you have a really great intuitive casting
departments and they know how these personalities will fit not
(10:12):
just on screen but behind the scenes, which really build
that foundational And.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
We had the great Genie backrack stars and she's she's
winning emmysweft and right now for the.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
I mean you can feel it from the pilot immediately.
You can feel the chemistry between all of you. It
feels like those relationships feel like they've been going for
years already.
Speaker 4 (10:33):
Know what's a funny thing is on Outer Banks, the
show I did after that, I remember so clearly being
in that giant table read which is just it's just
a production office, the long conference table. There's no reason
this should work. There's no reason could ever be good.
Get none of the you know, she has no wardrobe,
(10:54):
there's just people reading from a script. And that cast,
that group of young actors were Chase and Maddie, Maddy Bailey,
and it was just unbelievable. So afterwards, I go, how
long have they all known each other? And they're like
two days?
Speaker 2 (11:11):
Wow, oh this m this might be again a villain.
Literally there's like you have done everything.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
Yeah, well, you know, I think First of all, I
had worked with Jonas pate uh years before on something
where I was cast as a nice guy who turned
out to be a bad guy. It was on La
La Dragnet with Ed O'Neill, and so I think he
then somebody and his I think his wife and maybe
(11:43):
his daughter said this, you should look at this guy
who's on Nashville. And I think he said to me, goes.
You know, for the first four episodes, you just can
be sort of like a normal dad, and then it's
really going to go sideways. And they were lying. I
think they thought the sweet I mean, Deacon had his issue,
but he was also a guy at part. Yeah, that
would be a really good mislead. And for me, you know,
(12:06):
when you're coming off a role, I didn't want to
play Deacon Light or Deacon Olsen. The place something different.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
So much fun which happens. I mean that I think
the norm is for you to get really famous for
a certain role and then people like you as that,
they know you as that they keep wanting to see
you do that. But you have range. Thank you defied
all yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
Broken all barriers.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
I'm curious like music artists who then you know, pivot
into acting or you know, somebody who comes from theater
and then you.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Know, pivots into TV.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
For you like I feel like this, I don't feel
I know that it reinvigorated your.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Music career too.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
Oh yeah, okay, what.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Was like the trajectory of that for you?
Speaker 3 (13:01):
And then also kind of becoming a Guinness World Record Holders?
Speaker 1 (13:06):
Can you do.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Just take a break? Like do you just.
Speaker 4 (13:13):
Make hay while the sun shines? Right? Right?
Speaker 2 (13:15):
That's right?
Speaker 4 (13:16):
I mean, honestly, that's one of the things. I feel
very blessed. When I started playing decon was forty six,
and I've been really fortunate, like you said, to being
a whole bunch of really great things like Big Love,
enlightened on you know, the Office, so a lot of
quality things. But i'd never sort of popped above that
even on that on whose line is that anyway? I
(13:37):
was one of the fourth chair guys, I was. I
wasn't on every week, so it wasn't until that that
I sort of popped. So I think, I don't know,
maybe you appreciate it a little more, a little more deeply,
and you also want to go for it. That's just
my nature too. But so yeah, I was in a
band in college, and when I graduated, the rest of
(13:58):
the band was most of the band was year younger
and me and one of me and the drummers stayed
back one year, even though we both and played in
that band for another year. And then when that was done,
I thought maybe we'd stay together. But they all went
on to be, as the song says, doctors and lawyers
and such and so hood he lost all his blowfish,
(14:22):
And so I said, what am I going to do now?
And in the end, I said, you know what, maybe
if I go to Hollywood, I can be an actor.
Because I'd grown up on television, like crazy TV, buff
watched everything movies too. Rocky just set me on fire,
like as a kid. Because I left that theater just vigurated.
(14:43):
And I realized it was only because of lights flashing
on a screen that I wanted to be, you know,
beat up the world and drink raw eggs and and
so that. I was hooked then, but I back the
music stepped forward. I couldn't really. I could act a
little in college, but I mostly just could get up
on stage and and sing and play guitar. So I
thought I would go out to la and I figured
(15:04):
While I was doing that, I would meet a drummer
and a bass player and a guitar. That never happened,
but along the way I went out. The first job
I got was to go to England and play Buddy
Holly in the musical about the Great Buddy Holly.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Crazy. That was the first thing.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
Oh so crazy. You have no idea. I was leading
a musical and I'm playing guitar on stage. It was
just it was just perfect, and you.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Got to do like with that, you got crazy experiences.
You got to do like first gig you graduate college,
You're like, I'm just going to go form a band
in la and then next thing, you know.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
You know what's funny about that one is that one
of the first I did stand up for like that
quick because I didn't really enjoy it because it was
too solitary for me. I really had an admiration, not
for just how brave it is to get up and
do standings. Oh really, and the road is so solitary
and I'm more of a social animal, so I thought.
(15:59):
Then somebody showed me the groundlings, which was right. I
got my improv base and my sketch comedy based and
those that don't know the groundlings, go look them up,
everybody you so many SNL.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
Masters will barrel of care, you know.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
Krista wigg on and on and on, and so I
was doing that for all and I love that so
much that I became the house manager of the theater.
I was about la by myself, so I thought, I'm
going to submerge myself in this world. So I'm literally
tearing tickets, vacuuming, holding the small And so while I'm
(16:36):
doing that, I get a call from my managers, h
do you want to audition to play Buddy Holly in London?
And I was like yes, And so I went all out.
I got the little bow tie, I bought glasses, I
made my hair dark curly, I went I bought a
(16:57):
stratocaster on no. I was one hundred percent ready and
I didn't put it down and I played and I played,
and I'm ready for this. And I get a call
from the groundings. I had just retired from being house manager,
and they said, hey, I'm do you have a minute.
Our new house manager is not available in this group
that is going to do some events here. Need some help.
(17:18):
And so I said yes, And so I had this
person give me a call and they're asking how many
bathrooms we had? And we have copy? Is it? What
does this work? How does that work? I'm trying to
be pliet, but I'm getting to where I'm late now,
and I just cool and I keep my cool, and
then I rush over the hill and I barely make
it on time, and I do two scenes and I
(17:40):
sing two songs to Buddy, Holly songs, and she says, well,
we're definitely going to give you a call back. Do
you know where the Groundlings Theater is? And I went.
I had been on the phone with her and set
up my own call back at the Groundings Theater. So
when I tell you these things happened to me, Oh
(18:04):
so that was literally like in my living room because
I lived there more than I did my crappy little apartment.
Speaker 1 (18:10):
That's so crazy.
Speaker 4 (18:13):
And while all the other guys were auditioning for Buddy,
I was up in the booth. We're just going that
a little of that.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
I know, that's good.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
Yeah, yeah, wowow wow, that's.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
How I ended up getting the audition. Yeah no, my god,
like you said, as a first job, it was off
the charts.
Speaker 6 (18:35):
I played for her Royal Hot Highness and Queen Elizabeth.
I played the Princess Diana and the Young Princess I
played at the White House. I played with the actual Crickets,
buddy having in the Crickets. So I was just twenty six,
I think at the.
Speaker 4 (18:49):
Time, and what an unbelievable thing to be because what
I knew was the singing and the guitar acting classes
in Hollywood with Howard Fine, who was fantastic, and I
should have taken more with him. But being on stage
for two years and getting to do those same scenes
and I was on the stage ninety nine percent of
(19:11):
the night, getting to them again and again and feel
how to feel the nights I was thinking I was
saying it and feeling it and bel the knights. It
wasn't clicking. And that was a huge That was a
huge education, not to mention just what it means to
need a cast now interviewed like we are right now.
That was all that was my master's I think, and enacting.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
I just lovecelerated.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Yeah, I love how I mean you're saying, you know,
you're still like this and it's incredible and aspirational of
like you moved to La which can be daunting and scary,
and you you like meet meet it with open arms
and like an open mind, and like it seems like
you're a sponge to learning whatever it may be, whether
it's stand up or sketch comedy.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
You know, stand up gave me a real lesson, the
biggest less and I got from stand up. And I
didn't do it that long, as I said. But you know,
when you go to La, you Hollywood, you can't just
go be in a movie. I mean nowadays can make
your own on your mouth, which is crazy.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Back then, Nope, the opportunities were very, very limited.
Speaker 4 (20:14):
All you but you could do on a Wednesday. You
could go to the comedy store and wait in line
and get up at open mic at the same place
where Robin Williams had been and ste market at that
and at the improv. And so I did that, and
I remember I finally got up and I went up
to the microphone and I adjusted it and fixed it,
and I looked up and it was that quiet, and
(20:38):
I'll never forget my mouth started getting phoney. I felt
my knee a little bit. And I had never thought
that I was a class clown, I was a show.
I was never I didn't. It was foreign to me.
It was in my mind. I was like, oh, I
heard of this, You're terrified. So that's what I felt like.
(20:58):
And so somehow it through my five minutes and before
my feet even hit the ground to get off stage.
It's interesting to me still that my overriding emotion was fury.
I was furious with myself as I walked back to
the bathroom. There By the time I looked in the mirror,
I was thinking to myself, You've left an amazing girlfriend
(21:21):
back home. All your friends have real jobs, are making
real money, and came out here with nothing. And what
do you want to do for a living? You want
to get in front of people, and you just let
two hundred drunks that you will never mate again terrify you.
And so it's crazy is that That was so real
to me that a week later I went back same
(21:42):
when it's the same bad material, and I stood up
and I didn't feel a thing because I was more
afraid of me than them. It was a fortunate thing
to get to see the difference in that. Yeah, and
that sort of I carried that with me a lot.
There's to be able to do buddy, or do any
of those things. But I thought my mom has always
been if they're gonna let you, let you do it,
(22:03):
do it. I mean so much apologizing for I'm sorry
you let me do this. You probably shouldn't have let
me do this. I'll do my best, but I don't
know if no.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Damn, it's like hearing myself. That's right. I was just
thinking that. But you're right.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
I mean, and look at your body of work.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
And look at the things that you've gotten to do
and the opportunities you've taken. Some people would say, oh,
I don't do that. I don't do improv, I don't
do stand up, I don't do music.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
I don't do that.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
But like you know, just taking little bites horns and
saying like, let me try it.
Speaker 4 (22:36):
There's are times in my vife where I would uh
self demean and say uh with the phrases jack of
all trade, master of none, that's how you that's how
you talk that down, and I sort of meant it.
There was a time like Springsteen was a rock hero
early on, and if you read or know his story
at all, well, it reminds me of a rocket has
(22:59):
all this fuel inside of it and it gets ignited,
so it has all this propulsive pressure. It doesn't just
go everywhere, that's just an explosion. It is it is
directed out the batanolezl silver rocket goes, MHL.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
Goes yeah, right, like, how do we funnel this energy
into a direction.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
Yeah. And in the beginning it's I sort of envied
somebody that had that was Monomaniaco, had that one thing
that they aggressively shaped. I wasn't even that about acting.
I remember saying to my agents about it about six
months before Nashville. The problem with me is a client
is I'm basically pretty happy. I'm pretty satisfied. I like
(23:42):
you because I got a good luck, I said. I said,
the rest would be gravy, anything else, baby, And then
I said, now, don't get me wrong, I freaking love gravy.
Gravy's delicious, So you'll give me some gravy. And yeah,
I got biscuits and gravy here in Nashville.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
So yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:58):
So I would just say that later on, and I
think people are realizing it now. It's I think the
phrase talent stacking comes to mind, that you want to
have a handful of cards. Yes, I mean, certainly on
Broadway you don't want to just.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Oh yeah you need oh yeah, you have to be
able to do eighteen billion things at a very high level,
eighteens a week.
Speaker 4 (24:21):
That's uh yeah. I was. As I said, I've come close,
and being around those that do that, it's just stunning.
It's like, oh my gosh, you are a master of
all trades.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
So you've done it though, you know, ye tell me this.
Speaker 4 (24:34):
I remember this so clearly being I don't know if
it was the musical of it all, or that it
was a jukebox musical. Is one of the earliest jukebox musicals,
which we're really looked down on at the time, right yeah,
by now so much as a jukebox yeah, right, But
(24:55):
before Buddy, there weren't that many. There might have been one,
Hank Williams one, but I can't I think of one.
So was that the fact that it was in London.
It was so far from Hollywood, but I knew what
I had done there and how amazing it was. So
I remember my first general meeting with a casting director
once I was back, and she says, so, tell me
what you've been up to, and I go, well, for
(25:18):
the last year and eight months I starred as Buddy
Holly in the hit West End musical Buddy and I
toured with it in the United States and I had
that cast and played in front of the Queen and
the President and I said about former things, and I
just went, yeah. And before that, I did an industrial
film promotor. It made no impact. It might I might
(25:45):
have just said I worked at track Auto. Yes, I
mean it really didn't. Well that was a lot too
my world while she's sitting in front of me. That
was really that was really good improval my part right there.
I kept going, But I'm pretty good in those moments.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
But it did make you probably a better actor though,
right like it? Oh yeah, so that's the thing. That's
what you got, maybe not some more jobs out of it.
Speaker 4 (26:12):
I got to tell you one thing about getting one job.
I'll never forget this. The first TV show I was
on was called on the Television. It was like a
sketch comedy show on Nick at Night. I got hired
because one of the guys one of the groundings there,
George McGrath. It was his show. And so first I
did research for it because there was no Google. He
just had a guy like me go find out how
many continents there were then, and then I wrote a
(26:36):
sketch or two. I wrote maybe three sketches over the
course of it, and then it fell apart. And then
a friend said, hey, I know a guy who's over
at FNN. FNN eventually became c NBC, and so mostly
they had tippy crawl, and somebody figured, why don't we
do some shows for very very rich people. So they
had one show about appreciating art with Vincent Price, about
(26:57):
art that would go up and down on the mark
collecting art. One was Auto Trend, So that's about connecting
fine cars. I'm rushing through to get to this. So
I go. I don't I'm not really a writer. I
guess you'll be fine. Just go. And so I remember
going there on top of the building is way down
near La X, near the getty that not getting Howard Hughes,
(27:21):
and you can see everywhere, and there's a guy behind
an amazing desk. You on the phone. We'll tell him
this and gob on my box and he hangs up.
I don't have a boulder. I don't have a single
writing thing to show him. I got nothing. I'm just
sitting there across room like I'm sitting from you, and
he goes, so, uh, you're a writer, and yes I am.
(27:46):
And he says, well, what have you mostly written about?
And I said, well, mostly cars and art. He came
halfway across that desk like seriously, curiously, I said, no,
I'm just Affinnoyd to you, I said, I use the
(28:07):
Worsson and he goes, oh, it was so embarrassed, and
that made him laugh so hard. He goes. He finally recovers.
He goes, you know what, you get the job, you
get the job. And so I was a segment producer
and I wrote two shows about art and cars. And
I can't.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
A lesson to all. Yes, just charm the pants off.
Speaker 4 (28:37):
That little fearlessness and what are you gonna do?
Speaker 2 (28:39):
You know, you walk into the room unemployed, It's like,
what's the worst is going to happen? You live the
room still unemployed?
Speaker 4 (28:46):
I can do unemployed.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Yeah, it's like, I know, unemployed, we're comfying unemployed.
Speaker 4 (28:51):
Bad. We haven't talked about Nashville at all. Let me.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
So, now you guys do Nashville reunion tours as well?
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Is that right?
Speaker 4 (28:59):
Yeah? Yeah, this February we're going to be going back
for our for another tour back in the UK and
in Europe. That's what Claire Bowen plays Scarlett of course,
Sampo and Jackson was Avery and uh, we're really kind
of lucky to do it, but also shows the power
(29:20):
of the of the songs themselves. Still listen to them.
And we'll be playing One of my favorites is we'll
be at the Ryman Auditorium, which not there yet, but
spoiler alert, the whole series ends on stage at the
Rymond WO. So it's always been real important and special
(29:42):
to me. Yeah, a dog named Rymond, but.
Speaker 3 (29:45):
Go on, no, I mean, like a lot of these
institutions for country music for you guys, are you know
key locations in the show, Like what was that like
for you? Like Blueburugh Cafe and like the Aubrey, Like
what was that like for you to be able to
like step on the you know, I'm over home on
the stage one hundred and fifty seven times.
Speaker 4 (30:06):
But yeah, well, the coolest thing about it was it
was always that Deacon got to play these places before
I did. It was always cool. So literally, you know
how it is if you're going to shoot a scene
on stage at the Grand Ole lotpry you might be
there two whole days. Yeah, you know, thirteen hour days.
And that was it me standing with the guitar on
(30:27):
stage at the Grand Old Lopry. So by the time
it was my time to get up there, I felt
some of those little old fashioned butterflies, but I was fine.
But also I've often thought that you could, I really
want to go to locations and get a map, and
if we highlighted every single place where there's one right
behind me. Look at that right there, busy. Yes, you
know the pilot episode.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Yeah, well you guys do you and Connie have your
like big scene in the pilot.
Speaker 4 (30:52):
And then there's more later and later later episodes. So
my wife bought me that because, you know, bridgemant to
me and us the guitar I stole from Nashville amazing.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Yes, oh yeah, no way, oh yeah, that's beautiful.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Yeah, so's special. They forgot to ask for it back. Yeah.
So yeah, it was I think, honestly, you know, Connie
and Hayden first, but the real star of Nashville was Nashville,
and I think it really showed it off and too.
I mean, this town was already starting to boom, but
(31:35):
the combination of the actual boom that was and showing
it to the world. We get blamed for the traffic
all the time, and all for all the new buildings.
I'll tell you one other thing that you know, when
you're shooting on location, you have base camps where you
have your closed trailer, all the trailers, all the equipment.
This is where the actors trailers made, may here, makeup props,
all of that. We would do those in vacant lots
(31:57):
in the city. The time we were done, there were
no more vacant lots.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
That's crazy.
Speaker 4 (32:05):
They were all buildings. They had all been developed. Such
a bad Yeah. Yeah, the city has been amazing to us.
That's why I stayed. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
For me growing up, you know, trying to become an
actor and do TV and I also did music pre acting.
I always got asked, you know, well you have to
do one or the other, like you can't do both,
And here you are. You know, that's sort of I
only had two choices. You know, you grew up with
a host of skills, acquiring a host of skills, and
(32:45):
then something like Nashville comes along, where you know it's
all this all this acting work leading you to being
a leading man. You started out in a band, and
here's the show based around music. And how did that
feel like the opportunity to do a musical TV show?
Because obviously, yes, Glee was on smashes on but there.
(33:08):
That doesn't mean there were a lot of musical shows
being made. No, No, there weren't, and that opportunity never
came around.
Speaker 4 (33:14):
I'll tell you two things. One way I felt, and
this is a good way to feel when you reach
that certain age and you I felt like I reached
into my pocket and there was a whole bunch of
cardboard pieces in my pocket with flashes of color all
over them, and I just reached in my pocket. I
emptied my pockets out and I put them on a
table and I went and I put them all together.
(33:36):
It was Nashville. So every little thing that I had done,
every little piece of that, and all those years that
that rejection you got, and you know, what's that for?
I don't know that job that was a weird little job.
What's that? And all those things eventually became that. It's
just I felt so fortunate. It felt like a real
(33:57):
coming together. That example I gave of the magic behind it.
That's just one I'll tell you another I was, I've
never stopped writing music, like when I go to college.
Probably started off as more rock, more ram you twoish
when but as I started, I got married, started having kids.
You keep the station on something that the toddlers can
(34:18):
hear and right, and I started really loving that two
thousands country in nineties, early two thousands country. So just
another day in Paradise and all these things I was feeling.
And I also, to be honest, I write in a
more literal way, less metaphorical rock metaphor. I write stories,
and maybe it comes wrong with a punchline, or maybe
(34:39):
it's just ea, stop loving country. Yeah country. So we
got more and more country, and eventually, through a long
story I won't tell you, I met a Nashville songwriter,
wonderful woman named Jane Bach, and she would go back
and forth Nashville Toba. And I started writing with her
and she and I wrote six or seven songs over
these good months and they were pretty good. And so
(35:05):
she was telling me I knew what a writer's round was,
and so we actually had a writer's round out. I
think it was on cold or Kolanga. It was a
Korean barbecue place and at night we played a writer's round.
We played these songs and a bunch of people showed up. Yeah,
And at some point she said, Okay, now I want
you to come to Nashville. I want you to play
at the Bluebird Cafe. And I knew what the Bluebird Cafe,
(35:26):
and I was like done, and I bought a plane
ticket and so I'm already to go. It's on the calendar.
And then right before then I has always happened. I
got work, I got acting, and I had to do it.
So I canceled the ticket. And then a couple months
later I did it again, and I got work again,
and I literally say to my wife, when am I
ever going to get to go to Nashville. It's just
(35:46):
not going to happen, and be damn. I get the
script says Nashville. I auditioned over five times and I
get it. And my very first deacon scene was with
that guitar in the Bluebird Cafe.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
Oh my God, with the great.
Speaker 4 (36:04):
Pam Tillis singing harmonies with me and chairs at the
back of the room. Yeah, pulled low and a tear
going down her face at the sheer beauty of my song.
And I thought, what are you doing God? This is amazing.
This is amazing, And I've never stopped feeling that.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Yeah, oh my gosh, that's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I feel like music has that you know, speaks to you.
Guys are still able to go on tour after the
show has been off for a number of years because
I feel like, and tell me if you feel this,
The music aspect of it, I think keeps the show
alive for so many people, especially in Nashville. How Nashville
uses music is beautiful. It's always organic. You're not breaking
(36:46):
into song walking down a street necessarily. It's always in
a real place where music would be heard, and it
yet and it still furthers the story in a way
that's not hitting you over the head with what's going on.
Speaker 4 (36:59):
And I so agree, I actually would I've The first
thing I found out, I want to say is the
caliber of the music that we got to do that the.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
Great t Bone absolutely excellent.
Speaker 4 (37:10):
Peon Burnette. I don't know how many Grammys he has,
but his goal for our music, what he was aspiring
to was not to imitate country radio. He said he
was He's t Bone Burnette. He says he wanted to
be more than country radio. And we have a ton
of songs that would not be on country radio. Country
radio wouldn't always work in that moment. These songs are
(37:30):
incredibly residant. We didn't have a songwriting staff. Our songwriting
staff was Nashville and all the great writers, and they
all submitted these songs, and half of them were songs
that were just maybe a little too pure, a little
too amazing to be that next thing that you know
that the world listening to. But what I always found
(37:51):
that was really incredible was, first of all, as Deacon,
I played a guy that I'm not going to tell
you much. I'm not going to say that much. You
asked me some question I don't know, I don't know,
like this podcast would not be going well. But you
put them begun guitar and he'll tell you every single thing. Yeah. Yeah,
(38:11):
And so that was on that personal level, but it's
also on the scenic level. You've already seen, you guys
know how you can reach a certain point in a
scene where narratively or where verbally you've kind of said
all you can say. But I remember there's a scene
at the Bluebird Cafe, the first one where Deacon and
(38:31):
Reina who used to be together, and then she had to,
she had to separate for her own personal well being
and her child and all. And Deacon finally got clean,
but by then it was too late. She was with
Mayor Teddy. So they have kept this perfect little distance
where he's her guitar player, she's the least singer, and
(38:51):
they kept it right. And that's how that was. And
I think it's so beautiful that when what was the
catalyst that made that all fall apart? It was Deacon
playing the Bluebird and he invited Rain along and said,
will you sing one with me? Sure? And they sit
side by side and they sing no One will ever
Love You. And it's just they just got too close
(39:13):
to the fire. Because what music can do performance and
I think songwriting itself is very much like it's very intimate.
It's almost like these two people come together, go in
the room together, warm up, you get to know each other.
I'm not going to get graphic here, Yeah, but then
there's sort of this you conceive of something. Now when
(39:38):
you leave the room, there's this third thing that wasn't
that had not been there. And that third thing, this
this child, this song is that you birth can get
lost in the wind or it can go on to
rule the world and be you know, be like I
Will Always Love You by Dolly Partners. Yeah, just the
(39:58):
power of a song. And I've never forgotten that. There's
a few songs in Nashville. There's one called A Life
That's Good and that was written by Ashley Monroe and
Sarah Siskin and it's just so real and it's almost
like I finished pretty much every show with it, and
so does the Nashville cast because it's a little bit
like a prayer. It's just saying the whole show is
(40:19):
about everybody's trying to get this fame, get that money,
and get that you know, we know that, we're all
trying to get that next job, get that next get
that get those more followers. And A Life that's Good
just talks about you only need a handful of things
to have a life that's good. And the chorus and
I sang this on a TV show two arms around me,
heaven to ground me, and a family that always calls
(40:41):
me home, four wheels to get there, enough love to share,
and a sweet, sweet song. At the end of the day, Lord,
I pray I have a life that's good, that's that
just resonates with me. Wow.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
I think that's also why country music was the perfect
genre of music to have a musical TV show because
watching it, watching that pilot, I was like, of course,
of course.
Speaker 4 (41:10):
Just literally saying the thing to her without saying the
thing to her.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
But yes, because how you were talking about, like your
songwriting country I feel like at its best, and it
can be done in a number of like subgenres. But
you also get, just in that pilot alone, your testament
to the different styles of writing. Yes, the level of
writing and the show, but country music can affect you
so quickly and easily because it's a way of distilling
(41:38):
complex emotions in a simple way that that just cuts
through I think easier and quicker than most other musical genres.
Speaker 4 (41:45):
They old praise three chords in the truth.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
There you go.
Speaker 7 (41:48):
That's what I was trying to say perfectly from that
that side of it, And no, I absolutely feel that way,
and it was it was something to see just getting
these songs.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
Getting an email of this song going you're going to
be singing this and about week yeah, and also getting
to see the other people like can you imagine when
I first heard Lennon and Mazie singing on the set
or you know what. There's a scene at the very
end of the pilot where Waddie White played by the
(42:23):
great J. D. Salther, is that the Bluebird and he's
Claire and Sam yes, and he says, listen to this
and he holds up and she's somewhere else. But you
know how it is when you shoot a show, everybody
thinks we see everything. We don't hang out on the set.
I stopped, felt really good with Connie. It felt great
at The Bluebird. But then I watched like you guys
(42:45):
did on the on that night, and when that came on,
I go, wow, what Yeah, you know, I've never understood
competitive shows like your story. This person competes I always.
I just wanted them to freaking shine, because yes, and
they did.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
And they did absolutely.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (43:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (43:04):
Two of the things real quick, I want to say.
Number one, another show is interesting. I was my buddies
at Out of Banks. Jonas Pate, especially creator of a
show that's on Amazon now called The run Arounds, and
that's about a young high school band that is making
their way and it's crazy because these guys are so
incredibly talented. They the band is writing all yeah, and
(43:28):
they're performing them live right there. So yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
I discovered them a couple of weeks ago because as
a band I thought they were I was like, wait,
it's a TV show. They're from a TV show, but
they're also just like operating as a normal band outside
of the show totally.
Speaker 4 (43:43):
I mean, yeah, it's really really impressive, and so they're
doing it again. They actually had me come in and
do a little consulting in the writer's room as the
guy that was on the show with the music and on.
That was the real lot of fun and I got
to be really impressed by them. But you want to
go back to some people, what the heck was that about?
Was the Guinness World I just want to tell you
that real quick.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Please.
Speaker 4 (44:04):
I'm somebody that doesn't you know. There's a line in
a life that's good. It says, sometimes I'm hard on
me when dreams don't come easy. I want to look
back and say I did all that I could at
the end of the day. Lord, I pray I don't
know about you guys. I have that if I look
back and say I did all that I could, I
(44:25):
can be hurt by how it all came out. But
I won't. It won't eat me up.
Speaker 2 (44:29):
Now, you tried, right, If you.
Speaker 4 (44:32):
Didn't work hard enough for that audition, if you didn't,
if you're on that show and you know you just
didn't bring it that, that's a long time to live
with that. So I started around twenty twelve on Nashville.
Around twenty sixteen, I realized that I had released like
two songs. I've been writing all this music, and I said,
(44:54):
I have no idea if this thing's going to last.
I might be back in alve next year, and I'm
going to I can go. You lived in music city
for four years, had access to every great songwriter, yeah,
great producers, great players, and that's all you did. So
I said, ah, And so I created a little bit
of a deadline machine. I went out. I remember I
(45:15):
stood in a little stream near my house and I said,
he everybody, I just want to let you know that
I am going putting out a brand new single every
Friday until that's stupid and crazy. So I and I
called it every single Friday. At it well, and I
(45:37):
completely blew through that deadline. When it was stupid, I
went right through. I thought maybe I'd get twenty songs
but by the time I finished, it was fifty four
one for fifty four weeks on spot You can go
on Spotify or Apple and see it's every single Charles
Sen every single Friday project.
Speaker 1 (46:00):
And what a cool project.
Speaker 4 (46:02):
Oh man. That remember what I said about being on
stage with Buddy. That was my masters in songwriting and
my masterduction and I learned so much. That was my
ten thousand hours.
Speaker 1 (46:13):
That's literally what I was going to say.
Speaker 4 (46:15):
That's right, yeah, And so I only bring it up
because you meant because you did mention it, and to
say that there was one more of those things where
then I felt like, Okay, now I can never say
I didn't do all that's damn sure. But it's funny
because I was definitely one of I'm an old guy.
So I was one of those kids who, growing up
(46:35):
in like the eighties, had the Guinness Book of World
Records a paperback. I would walk around with it.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
Yeah right.
Speaker 4 (46:42):
It was like I was always trying to figure out
how many times I'd have to hop on a pogo
stick or how many gone I'd have to fit in
my mouth, And in the end, I just did this
thing that I desperately loved and went for it whole hog.
And I was on the Today Show, I think, and
the Guinness people came by and said, yeah, he's ever
done that?
Speaker 2 (47:01):
Wow, that's incredible.
Speaker 3 (47:04):
Well, we ask everybody who comes on the show in
our Glear era, what is the feeling that Lee leaves
you with? So if you remiss to ask, what is
the feeling that Nashville leaves you with?
Speaker 4 (47:17):
Man, you know what's great about that guitar is it's
it's got a really rich, warm, deep tone. And those
are the words that come to my mind. Nashville itself.
It's so rich, it was so warm. The people we
(47:38):
all got along is so great, and it was so deep.
It touches people still, people because I played this guy, Deacon.
Deacon went through a lot. Deacon was a walking country song.
You know, he lost his woman, yet he drank too much.
You know, he was sick himself. And what I found
(47:59):
is there those were touch points for people. So over
the years since people come up to me and go,
I love that show, and go and you know, my
dad he was an alcoholic too, and and so I
recognized what Deacon went through and it made me feel
for my dad a little bit. There's little things that
based on that you don't know, you know atching to it,
(48:19):
so I was, that's it rich and warm.
Speaker 2 (48:23):
Indeed, I feel like we could talk to you for hours,
and you are such a good storyteller, and it's also
so nice to talk to somebody else. I can't believe
there hasn't been any more Glee like Nashville Crossover because
it's such a specific experience and a musical TV show
and I know we speak that same language.
Speaker 4 (48:44):
Having there must have been something for you guys too,
I mean, because there was nothing remotely like it, so
like you had, nobody had quite gone before. I mean,
cop Rock had been.
Speaker 2 (48:55):
Like exactly a long time.
Speaker 4 (48:58):
It really wasn't this. Yeah, And that's and once again
the other thing, like you say, casting, that's just don't
much have it when you go people, it's it's not
that easy to go, hey, here's the show, here's what
we're going to do, not cast it.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Yeah, that's right. But hearing your stories makes me feel
warm because it reminds me and I'm sure Jenna feels
the same way. That just reminds me of our Glee family.
And I love that you know, that experience was that
for all of you and because it's such a special
thing to be a part of a show that probably
(49:32):
shouldn't work. Musicals on TV just hadn't really worked. And
when you get to do it in a way that
is touching so many lives, it's more than you could
ever wish for getting a job right like on a
TV show, it's touching people, like you said, And so
I'm just.
Speaker 4 (49:48):
Not that there's not struggles either, not bec there's sometimes
this between people feeling things and wanting to bring it
across and no.
Speaker 2 (49:57):
But your family and you get into it.
Speaker 4 (49:59):
And even with the network like network probably always wanted
a little bit more of a uh something uh scandal
or something away with murder, or about the ambition of
it all and about the crazy storylines that you need
to bring to bring that next pow pow. But I
(50:20):
think it's funny thing is we did six seasons that
and crazy things happen as they do in town, but
nobody remembers them. Everybody remembers the little moments between Gunner
and in Scarlett, or between a Starlett and Deacon, or
between Deacon and Maddie his daughters. It's the pressure, little
truthful moments that you got it it's almost like you
(50:43):
have to pay for them with this vision. I mean,
what's the classic thing with the famous actors. They say
one for them, one for me. Right, It's almost like
there are scenes you feel sometimes like, Okay, this is
this is from.
Speaker 2 (50:58):
That's exactly right, Yeah, exactly right.
Speaker 1 (51:01):
You get it, you get it.
Speaker 4 (51:04):
Well.
Speaker 1 (51:04):
We are so grateful.
Speaker 3 (51:05):
Thank you so much for taking the time to come
and chat with us. It's really wonderful and we are
just so in all of your body of work, but
also just like the approach you take to life, and
that really speaks to your career and what you've accomplished
and what you'll continue to accomplish.
Speaker 4 (51:21):
So thank you so much, incredibly kind, and you guys
are great at this. I can see why you're doing this,
and we're all very much that you turned your gaze
over to Nashville and you know it.
Speaker 2 (51:31):
Oh, I'm so happy. We have to stop ourselves from
just being in Nashville show because look, I will tell you,
I grew up in Texas. I didn't love country music.
I was sort of probably because I was around all
the time. I was like anti country music, and I
don't know. By the end of that pilot I was like,
(51:51):
of course, of course, obviously. Yeah, but by the end
of that pilot, I was like, I am in.
Speaker 4 (52:00):
I didn't like country music before, and I mean, that's
about the kindest thing you could ever get.
Speaker 2 (52:03):
Yeah, that's the biggest comment. Exactly right, exactly, Yeah, contact
after forty minutes.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (52:11):
Thank you for to see you on tour.
Speaker 4 (52:14):
No, that'd be fantastic. Yeah, well we come to the
rhyme and that's in January, and otherwise coming over to
the UK.
Speaker 2 (52:20):
Amazing. Oh great, we'll make to see you in person soon.
Thank you for your reach out.
Speaker 4 (52:26):
If you guys come to Nashville.
Speaker 2 (52:27):
Seriously, definitely, definitely.
Speaker 4 (52:31):
Please.
Speaker 2 (52:31):
I've never been. I want to come there.
Speaker 4 (52:33):
Bro. Yeah yea, well you've seen the places we shot
in him, so it'll be good. All right.
Speaker 2 (52:38):
Thanks, thank you so much, worse, thank you. What a man,
what a man, gosh, I mean, just insane.
Speaker 3 (52:49):
We have him back, so kind, so talented, so just
a good all around human I mean. And also we
love Nashville. Kevin loves Nashville. Now let it let it
be known.
Speaker 2 (53:04):
The record show. And also this is why you get hired.
He's so kind, so thoughtful.
Speaker 3 (53:09):
Yeah, well, I hope you guys enjoyed that conversation. Thank
you so much to Charles for joining us and chatting
all about his amazing life experience and his career in Nashville.
I hope you guys enjoyed that.
Speaker 2 (53:21):
And go watch Nashville on Netflix. Go see them on
tour starting in January. Yeah, yeah, and that's what you
really miss Thanks for listening, and follow us on Instagram
at and that's what you really miss pod. Make sure
to write us a review and leave us five stars.
See you next time.
And that's what you really missed with Jenna.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
And Kevin An iHeartRadio podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Welcome to you, and That's what you really miss podcast.
Oh my gosh, Oh my gosh, Oh my gosh. We
have Charles Auston here today from I mean, I want
to say from Nashville, but he's not from Nashville.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
He's from everything. He's from the industry, everything you've ever seen,
from stand.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Up comedy to Who's On is in any way improv
to the groundlings, to Nashville to the World Guinness World
Book of Records, to the Grand Old Lobbry, to a
family man and Outer.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Banks, I mean the naming.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
He's done it so truly. I am the man doesn't
need an introduction. But we have Charlal Duston here today,
and we hope you guys enjoyed this conversation.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
We talked about it all.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Shares some Nashville insight with us. His whole career has
just been completely insane. Oh buddy, Holly, pretty Holly, and
on the West end. I mean, it's just and needs
a lot of full circles.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
So wild. He's tapped into something. This story. The amount
of times I got goosebumps hearing his stories. I know,
I know, but hear from the man himself.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Hey good, how are you?
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Thanks for having me?
Speaker 2 (01:22):
This is an honor. Let me tell you. So we
finished watching Glee and we're watching all these musical TV
shows and movies. And I hadn't seen Nashville until last
week because it was on during Glee. I don't know
if I had some type of complex about it. I
don't know what it was. Oh, you better believe I'm
(01:44):
binge watching it.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
I I get it. So we'll get into this. Charles,
you have You have the craziest career wild Yeah. I
think the only person to have never been typecast. You
played everything. You've done everything. There's nothing you can't do.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
I okay, fair enough.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
No you can do it? No, no, no, I don't believe that.
I believe if you were presented with the challenge you
could do it.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
You could do it.
Speaker 4 (02:18):
Well. Ask the Broadway director that fired me.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
I think that's a director's problem. We just watched Nashville. Obviously,
there's so much crossover between Glee and Nashville and the
way how we felt doing a musical show, how it
connects with fans. How did you come to be on Nashville.
(02:44):
What was this experience, well.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
Person of Allly before that, I think you're absolutely right.
I think the business always has to be shown something
can work a lot of times before they say, okay,
we'll give it a shot. And Glee showed just how
it could work and how you know, you could sing
and act and it would take the scene to another
(03:07):
place to bear. Smash was on before us as well,
so they also showed it in that way, and I
think both of those things opened up the door for this.
Having said that, I know that the producers. Steve Buchanan
is an incredible guy here in Nashville who there's three
main places in Nashville. You got the Ryman Auditorium where
(03:30):
the Grand Old Opera used to be when it got
You have the New Opry House and the Bluebird Cafe,
and Steve was ran two of them. He ran the Ryman.
He was had a lot to do with the renovation
of the Rhymen and bringing it back to its former glory,
and he had a lot to do with the Grand
Old Opry. He did that for a number of years,
and he had had this germ of an idea of
(03:52):
what would it be like to be backstage at the Opry.
I can tell you now I get to play it
again this coming month and one eighty seventh time. Oh
the reason I say that, besides just the absolutely bred
as he said, is to tell you he was right.
It's really First of all, it's an amazing show, but
(04:13):
backstage it's so interesting and it's so cool. Eventually he
got that idea and Callie Curry oscar Winning Kelly currya.
She wrote Thoma and Luis. She is the one that
came up with all these incredible characters. I just think of.
You know so often you're not there for the most
important days of your life. I wasn't there when Callie
(04:34):
Curry thought up a guy named Deacon Claiborne. Yeah, but
she thought up all these characters, and along with she
and R. J. Cutler, who was one of the original
producers and the original director of the pilot, they started
casting this thing. Now, as you said, I've been in
the business a long time and I've done this, and
I've done that and the other. And I'd have to
say that again and again. I got to be in
(04:57):
some really cool projects. But to be the bang on
lead of something I just kept getting beat out, just
run finish line like I always the other guy that
almost got at And so I remember thinking, well, you
know what, I've been playing music longer than i've been acting,
and I was in a bandoned college before I went
to LA. Maybe I got a shot at this one
(05:19):
because of this other skill I got. But I have
to say it took a long time. I mean, we
could have a whole podcast just about that audition process.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
The only auditions did you have to do?
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Oh gosh, I'm gonna say more than at least five wow,
And yeah yeah, and I was, by the way, I
was the last piece of the puzzle. Wow. One funny
audition story real quickly is that. And I've always found this,
I don't know if you've ever found this, that the
projects that have that magic about them, like thinks of
(05:53):
the lap a little as my mom calls them, God incidents,
is things like that. Years ago, I was on a
show called who Line Is It Anyway?
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Which is crazy because and you're incredible on that show. Yeah, yeah,
wild different, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:10):
I was. I was a lot younger. I was chip.
I was making things up off the top of my
head with those incredible castmates of mine, I would leave
that show. I remember one day driving home because we
would do like a long like three three and a
half hours showing a live audience, and from that you
would make another number of episodes. I remember driving home
(06:31):
going why did my face hurt so much? And then
I ranting like an idiot?
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Yes a half hours and also you know, thank.
Speaker 4 (06:43):
You, and any about What I wanted to say was
I got the audition for to play Deacon, and I
look at the thing to go huh, and I realized
it was on the same lot, it was in the
same building. It was on the same floor that my
dressing room was in when I did whose line is
it anyway? Wow, that feels like a little bit of
(07:05):
And so I remember going in there and I did
I think two songs, one song and two scenes, and
I remember by them being very comfortable. I think if
I had been even a couple of years younger, I
wouldn't have been able to play a guy named Deacon
who'd seen about it. You can't be nervous when you're
auditioning for Deacon, because you can't chip I'm a little
(07:27):
bit of a lean forward on my seat. What do
you want me to be? What do you want me
to do? Guy? But Deacon is Deacon is this guy? Like,
by the way, I wore my Deacon down them just
for the love and anyway, So I'm in that room
and uh. I finished with the songs. And as I finished,
I walk out the door. I opened the door and
(07:48):
I bumped the door bumps into Hayden Panettier, who had
been dropping at the door. And she's like, and she
was so complimentary and so kind, and we never met.
I was a big fan already from Save the Cheerleader,
Saved the World from here, yeah, and from Remember the Titans, which,
(08:09):
of course that was the high school I went to.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
Oh wow, I played on.
Speaker 4 (08:15):
That football football team.
Speaker 5 (08:16):
So yeah, and I remember I said a few words
back and forth with her, and right as we were leaving,
I said, well, i'll see on the set, and I'll
never forget first day on the set.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
She walks up, she goes, I'll see on the set.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
That must have felt nice.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
And you did get the leading man gig.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Yeah, he did play that guy. It was really amazing.
It's also funny to me or interesting. There was never
a chemistry read with Connie. With Connie Brittain, so really
a little bit of a dice roll is there is there? There?
There is there anything?
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Five auditions and they didn't think to do a chemistry test.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
Yeah, I guess, I don't know. I mean it was
the last pieced doing other things, but wow, it ended
up working out. Yeah. I mean, I was again already
a huge fan of hers. Friday Night Lights was one
of those shows. You know those shows you watch and
you hit pause and say to the person, I just
want to do a show.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Oh yeah, you know what I mean, Yeah, totally.
Speaker 4 (09:23):
The more people that are with us that have to listen, Yeah,
can I just watched Friday Night.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
You don't understand. This doesn't happen very often.
Speaker 4 (09:34):
So I did that. So when I met Connie, I
walked right up to and I said, there's a million
reasons why I'm excited to do the show, and you
are a couple hundred of them. We got along like that,
and I remember those early scenes where we were both like,
this might work, there might be something.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
I think that that's a testament to, you know, the
production team and casting. I think we had a similar
experience where none of us had done any chemistry reads
about we auditioned. I think four times. I audition four times.
And so if you have a really great intuitive casting
departments and they know how these personalities will fit not
(10:12):
just on screen but behind the scenes, which really build
that foundational And.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
We had the great Genie backrack stars and she's she's
winning emmysweft and right now for the.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
I mean you can feel it from the pilot immediately.
You can feel the chemistry between all of you. It
feels like those relationships feel like they've been going for
years already.
Speaker 4 (10:33):
Know what's a funny thing is on Outer Banks, the
show I did after that, I remember so clearly being
in that giant table read which is just it's just
a production office, the long conference table. There's no reason
this should work. There's no reason could ever be good.
Get none of the you know, she has no wardrobe,
(10:54):
there's just people reading from a script. And that cast,
that group of young actors were Chase and Maddie, Maddy Bailey,
and it was just unbelievable. So afterwards, I go, how
long have they all known each other? And they're like
two days?
Speaker 2 (11:11):
Wow, oh this m this might be again a villain.
Literally there's like you have done everything.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
Yeah, well, you know, I think First of all, I
had worked with Jonas pate uh years before on something
where I was cast as a nice guy who turned
out to be a bad guy. It was on La
La Dragnet with Ed O'Neill, and so I think he
then somebody and his I think his wife and maybe
(11:43):
his daughter said this, you should look at this guy
who's on Nashville. And I think he said to me, goes.
You know, for the first four episodes, you just can
be sort of like a normal dad, and then it's
really going to go sideways. And they were lying. I
think they thought the sweet I mean, Deacon had his issue,
but he was also a guy at part. Yeah, that
would be a really good mislead. And for me, you know,
(12:06):
when you're coming off a role, I didn't want to
play Deacon Light or Deacon Olsen. The place something different.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
So much fun which happens. I mean that I think
the norm is for you to get really famous for
a certain role and then people like you as that,
they know you as that they keep wanting to see
you do that. But you have range. Thank you defied
all yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
Broken all barriers.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
I'm curious like music artists who then you know, pivot
into acting or you know, somebody who comes from theater
and then you.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Know, pivots into TV.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
For you like I feel like this, I don't feel
I know that it reinvigorated your.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Music career too.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
Oh yeah, okay, what.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Was like the trajectory of that for you?
Speaker 3 (13:01):
And then also kind of becoming a Guinness World Record Holders?
Speaker 1 (13:06):
Can you do.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Just take a break? Like do you just.
Speaker 4 (13:13):
Make hay while the sun shines? Right? Right?
Speaker 2 (13:15):
That's right?
Speaker 4 (13:16):
I mean, honestly, that's one of the things. I feel
very blessed. When I started playing decon was forty six,
and I've been really fortunate, like you said, to being
a whole bunch of really great things like Big Love,
enlightened on you know, the Office, so a lot of
quality things. But i'd never sort of popped above that
even on that on whose line is that anyway? I
(13:37):
was one of the fourth chair guys, I was. I
wasn't on every week, so it wasn't until that that
I sort of popped. So I think, I don't know,
maybe you appreciate it a little more, a little more deeply,
and you also want to go for it. That's just
my nature too. But so yeah, I was in a
band in college, and when I graduated, the rest of
(13:58):
the band was most of the band was year younger
and me and one of me and the drummers stayed
back one year, even though we both and played in
that band for another year. And then when that was done,
I thought maybe we'd stay together. But they all went
on to be, as the song says, doctors and lawyers
and such and so hood he lost all his blowfish,
(14:22):
And so I said, what am I going to do now?
And in the end, I said, you know what, maybe
if I go to Hollywood, I can be an actor.
Because I'd grown up on television, like crazy TV, buff
watched everything movies too. Rocky just set me on fire,
like as a kid. Because I left that theater just vigurated.
(14:43):
And I realized it was only because of lights flashing
on a screen that I wanted to be, you know,
beat up the world and drink raw eggs and and
so that. I was hooked then, but I back the
music stepped forward. I couldn't really. I could act a
little in college, but I mostly just could get up
on stage and and sing and play guitar. So I
thought I would go out to la and I figured
(15:04):
While I was doing that, I would meet a drummer
and a bass player and a guitar. That never happened,
but along the way I went out. The first job
I got was to go to England and play Buddy
Holly in the musical about the Great Buddy Holly.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Crazy. That was the first thing.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
Oh so crazy. You have no idea. I was leading
a musical and I'm playing guitar on stage. It was
just it was just perfect, and you.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Got to do like with that, you got crazy experiences.
You got to do like first gig you graduate college,
You're like, I'm just going to go form a band
in la and then next thing, you know.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
You know what's funny about that one is that one
of the first I did stand up for like that
quick because I didn't really enjoy it because it was
too solitary for me. I really had an admiration, not
for just how brave it is to get up and
do standings. Oh really, and the road is so solitary
and I'm more of a social animal, so I thought.
(15:59):
Then somebody showed me the groundlings, which was right. I
got my improv base and my sketch comedy based and
those that don't know the groundlings, go look them up,
everybody you so many SNL.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
Masters will barrel of care, you know.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
Krista wigg on and on and on, and so I
was doing that for all and I love that so
much that I became the house manager of the theater.
I was about la by myself, so I thought, I'm
going to submerge myself in this world. So I'm literally
tearing tickets, vacuuming, holding the small And so while I'm
(16:36):
doing that, I get a call from my managers, h
do you want to audition to play Buddy Holly in London?
And I was like yes, And so I went all out.
I got the little bow tie, I bought glasses, I
made my hair dark curly, I went I bought a
(16:57):
stratocaster on no. I was one hundred percent ready and
I didn't put it down and I played and I played,
and I'm ready for this. And I get a call
from the groundings. I had just retired from being house manager,
and they said, hey, I'm do you have a minute.
Our new house manager is not available in this group
that is going to do some events here. Need some help.
(17:18):
And so I said yes, And so I had this
person give me a call and they're asking how many
bathrooms we had? And we have copy? Is it? What
does this work? How does that work? I'm trying to
be pliet, but I'm getting to where I'm late now,
and I just cool and I keep my cool, and
then I rush over the hill and I barely make
it on time, and I do two scenes and I
(17:40):
sing two songs to Buddy, Holly songs, and she says, well,
we're definitely going to give you a call back. Do
you know where the Groundlings Theater is? And I went.
I had been on the phone with her and set
up my own call back at the Groundings Theater. So
when I tell you these things happened to me, Oh
(18:04):
so that was literally like in my living room because
I lived there more than I did my crappy little apartment.
Speaker 1 (18:10):
That's so crazy.
Speaker 4 (18:13):
And while all the other guys were auditioning for Buddy,
I was up in the booth. We're just going that
a little of that.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
I know, that's good.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
Yeah, yeah, wowow wow, that's.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
How I ended up getting the audition. Yeah no, my god,
like you said, as a first job, it was off
the charts.
Speaker 6 (18:35):
I played for her Royal Hot Highness and Queen Elizabeth.
I played the Princess Diana and the Young Princess I
played at the White House. I played with the actual Crickets,
buddy having in the Crickets. So I was just twenty six,
I think at the.
Speaker 4 (18:49):
Time, and what an unbelievable thing to be because what
I knew was the singing and the guitar acting classes
in Hollywood with Howard Fine, who was fantastic, and I
should have taken more with him. But being on stage
for two years and getting to do those same scenes
and I was on the stage ninety nine percent of
(19:11):
the night, getting to them again and again and feel
how to feel the nights I was thinking I was
saying it and feeling it and bel the knights. It
wasn't clicking. And that was a huge That was a
huge education, not to mention just what it means to
need a cast now interviewed like we are right now.
That was all that was my master's I think, and enacting.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
I just lovecelerated.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Yeah, I love how I mean you're saying, you know,
you're still like this and it's incredible and aspirational of
like you moved to La which can be daunting and scary,
and you you like meet meet it with open arms
and like an open mind, and like it seems like
you're a sponge to learning whatever it may be, whether
it's stand up or sketch comedy.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
You know, stand up gave me a real lesson, the
biggest less and I got from stand up. And I
didn't do it that long, as I said. But you know,
when you go to La, you Hollywood, you can't just
go be in a movie. I mean nowadays can make
your own on your mouth, which is crazy.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Back then, Nope, the opportunities were very, very limited.
Speaker 4 (20:14):
All you but you could do on a Wednesday. You
could go to the comedy store and wait in line
and get up at open mic at the same place
where Robin Williams had been and ste market at that
and at the improv. And so I did that, and
I remember I finally got up and I went up
to the microphone and I adjusted it and fixed it,
and I looked up and it was that quiet, and
(20:38):
I'll never forget my mouth started getting phoney. I felt
my knee a little bit. And I had never thought
that I was a class clown, I was a show.
I was never I didn't. It was foreign to me.
It was in my mind. I was like, oh, I
heard of this, You're terrified. So that's what I felt like.
(20:58):
And so somehow it through my five minutes and before
my feet even hit the ground to get off stage.
It's interesting to me still that my overriding emotion was fury.
I was furious with myself as I walked back to
the bathroom. There By the time I looked in the mirror,
I was thinking to myself, You've left an amazing girlfriend
(21:21):
back home. All your friends have real jobs, are making
real money, and came out here with nothing. And what
do you want to do for a living? You want
to get in front of people, and you just let
two hundred drunks that you will never mate again terrify you.
And so it's crazy is that That was so real
to me that a week later I went back same
(21:42):
when it's the same bad material, and I stood up
and I didn't feel a thing because I was more
afraid of me than them. It was a fortunate thing
to get to see the difference in that. Yeah, and
that sort of I carried that with me a lot.
There's to be able to do buddy, or do any
of those things. But I thought my mom has always
been if they're gonna let you, let you do it,
(22:03):
do it. I mean so much apologizing for I'm sorry
you let me do this. You probably shouldn't have let
me do this. I'll do my best, but I don't
know if no.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Damn, it's like hearing myself. That's right. I was just
thinking that. But you're right.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
I mean, and look at your body of work.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
And look at the things that you've gotten to do
and the opportunities you've taken. Some people would say, oh,
I don't do that. I don't do improv, I don't
do stand up, I don't do music.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
I don't do that.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
But like you know, just taking little bites horns and
saying like, let me try it.
Speaker 4 (22:36):
There's are times in my vife where I would uh
self demean and say uh with the phrases jack of
all trade, master of none, that's how you that's how
you talk that down, and I sort of meant it.
There was a time like Springsteen was a rock hero
early on, and if you read or know his story
at all, well, it reminds me of a rocket has
(22:59):
all this fuel inside of it and it gets ignited,
so it has all this propulsive pressure. It doesn't just
go everywhere, that's just an explosion. It is it is
directed out the batanolezl silver rocket goes, MHL.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
Goes yeah, right, like, how do we funnel this energy
into a direction.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
Yeah. And in the beginning it's I sort of envied
somebody that had that was Monomaniaco, had that one thing
that they aggressively shaped. I wasn't even that about acting.
I remember saying to my agents about it about six
months before Nashville. The problem with me is a client
is I'm basically pretty happy. I'm pretty satisfied. I like
(23:42):
you because I got a good luck, I said. I said,
the rest would be gravy, anything else, baby, And then
I said, now, don't get me wrong, I freaking love gravy.
Gravy's delicious, So you'll give me some gravy. And yeah,
I got biscuits and gravy here in Nashville.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
So yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:58):
So I would just say that later on, and I
think people are realizing it now. It's I think the
phrase talent stacking comes to mind, that you want to
have a handful of cards. Yes, I mean, certainly on
Broadway you don't want to just.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Oh yeah you need oh yeah, you have to be
able to do eighteen billion things at a very high level,
eighteens a week.
Speaker 4 (24:21):
That's uh yeah. I was. As I said, I've come close,
and being around those that do that, it's just stunning.
It's like, oh my gosh, you are a master of
all trades.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
So you've done it though, you know, ye tell me this.
Speaker 4 (24:34):
I remember this so clearly being I don't know if
it was the musical of it all, or that it
was a jukebox musical. Is one of the earliest jukebox musicals,
which we're really looked down on at the time, right yeah,
by now so much as a jukebox yeah, right, But
(24:55):
before Buddy, there weren't that many. There might have been one,
Hank Williams one, but I can't I think of one.
So was that the fact that it was in London.
It was so far from Hollywood, but I knew what
I had done there and how amazing it was. So
I remember my first general meeting with a casting director
once I was back, and she says, so, tell me
what you've been up to, and I go, well, for
(25:18):
the last year and eight months I starred as Buddy
Holly in the hit West End musical Buddy and I
toured with it in the United States and I had
that cast and played in front of the Queen and
the President and I said about former things, and I
just went, yeah. And before that, I did an industrial
film promotor. It made no impact. It might I might
(25:45):
have just said I worked at track Auto. Yes, I
mean it really didn't. Well that was a lot too
my world while she's sitting in front of me. That
was really that was really good improval my part right there.
I kept going, But I'm pretty good in those moments.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
But it did make you probably a better actor though,
right like it? Oh yeah, so that's the thing. That's
what you got, maybe not some more jobs out of it.
Speaker 4 (26:12):
I got to tell you one thing about getting one job.
I'll never forget this. The first TV show I was
on was called on the Television. It was like a
sketch comedy show on Nick at Night. I got hired
because one of the guys one of the groundings there,
George McGrath. It was his show. And so first I
did research for it because there was no Google. He
just had a guy like me go find out how
many continents there were then, and then I wrote a
(26:36):
sketch or two. I wrote maybe three sketches over the
course of it, and then it fell apart. And then
a friend said, hey, I know a guy who's over
at FNN. FNN eventually became c NBC, and so mostly
they had tippy crawl, and somebody figured, why don't we
do some shows for very very rich people. So they
had one show about appreciating art with Vincent Price, about
(26:57):
art that would go up and down on the mark
collecting art. One was Auto Trend, So that's about connecting
fine cars. I'm rushing through to get to this. So
I go. I don't I'm not really a writer. I
guess you'll be fine. Just go. And so I remember
going there on top of the building is way down
near La X, near the getty that not getting Howard Hughes,
(27:21):
and you can see everywhere, and there's a guy behind
an amazing desk. You on the phone. We'll tell him
this and gob on my box and he hangs up.
I don't have a boulder. I don't have a single
writing thing to show him. I got nothing. I'm just
sitting there across room like I'm sitting from you, and
he goes, so, uh, you're a writer, and yes I am.
(27:46):
And he says, well, what have you mostly written about?
And I said, well, mostly cars and art. He came
halfway across that desk like seriously, curiously, I said, no,
I'm just Affinnoyd to you, I said, I use the
(28:07):
Worsson and he goes, oh, it was so embarrassed, and
that made him laugh so hard. He goes. He finally recovers.
He goes, you know what, you get the job, you
get the job. And so I was a segment producer
and I wrote two shows about art and cars. And
I can't.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
A lesson to all. Yes, just charm the pants off.
Speaker 4 (28:37):
That little fearlessness and what are you gonna do?
Speaker 2 (28:39):
You know, you walk into the room unemployed, It's like,
what's the worst is going to happen? You live the
room still unemployed?
Speaker 4 (28:46):
I can do unemployed.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Yeah, it's like, I know, unemployed, we're comfying unemployed.
Speaker 4 (28:51):
Bad. We haven't talked about Nashville at all. Let me.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
So, now you guys do Nashville reunion tours as well?
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Is that right?
Speaker 4 (28:59):
Yeah? Yeah, this February we're going to be going back
for our for another tour back in the UK and
in Europe. That's what Claire Bowen plays Scarlett of course,
Sampo and Jackson was Avery and uh, we're really kind
of lucky to do it, but also shows the power
(29:20):
of the of the songs themselves. Still listen to them.
And we'll be playing One of my favorites is we'll
be at the Ryman Auditorium, which not there yet, but
spoiler alert, the whole series ends on stage at the
Rymond WO. So it's always been real important and special
(29:42):
to me. Yeah, a dog named Rymond, but.
Speaker 3 (29:45):
Go on, no, I mean, like a lot of these
institutions for country music for you guys, are you know
key locations in the show, Like what was that like
for you? Like Blueburugh Cafe and like the Aubrey, Like
what was that like for you to be able to
like step on the you know, I'm over home on
the stage one hundred and fifty seven times.
Speaker 4 (30:06):
But yeah, well, the coolest thing about it was it
was always that Deacon got to play these places before
I did. It was always cool. So literally, you know
how it is if you're going to shoot a scene
on stage at the Grand Ole lotpry you might be
there two whole days. Yeah, you know, thirteen hour days.
And that was it me standing with the guitar on
(30:27):
stage at the Grand Old Lopry. So by the time
it was my time to get up there, I felt
some of those little old fashioned butterflies, but I was fine.
But also I've often thought that you could, I really
want to go to locations and get a map, and
if we highlighted every single place where there's one right
behind me. Look at that right there, busy. Yes, you
know the pilot episode.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Yeah, well you guys do you and Connie have your
like big scene in the pilot.
Speaker 4 (30:52):
And then there's more later and later later episodes. So
my wife bought me that because, you know, bridgemant to
me and us the guitar I stole from Nashville amazing.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Yes, oh yeah, no way, oh yeah, that's beautiful.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Yeah, so's special. They forgot to ask for it back. Yeah.
So yeah, it was I think, honestly, you know, Connie
and Hayden first, but the real star of Nashville was Nashville,
and I think it really showed it off and too.
I mean, this town was already starting to boom, but
(31:35):
the combination of the actual boom that was and showing
it to the world. We get blamed for the traffic
all the time, and all for all the new buildings.
I'll tell you one other thing that you know, when
you're shooting on location, you have base camps where you
have your closed trailer, all the trailers, all the equipment.
This is where the actors trailers made, may here, makeup props,
all of that. We would do those in vacant lots
(31:57):
in the city. The time we were done, there were
no more vacant lots.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
That's crazy.
Speaker 4 (32:05):
They were all buildings. They had all been developed. Such
a bad Yeah. Yeah, the city has been amazing to us.
That's why I stayed. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
For me growing up, you know, trying to become an
actor and do TV and I also did music pre acting.
I always got asked, you know, well you have to
do one or the other, like you can't do both,
And here you are. You know, that's sort of I
only had two choices. You know, you grew up with
a host of skills, acquiring a host of skills, and
(32:45):
then something like Nashville comes along, where you know it's
all this all this acting work leading you to being
a leading man. You started out in a band, and
here's the show based around music. And how did that
feel like the opportunity to do a musical TV show?
Because obviously, yes, Glee was on smashes on but there.
(33:08):
That doesn't mean there were a lot of musical shows
being made. No, No, there weren't, and that opportunity never
came around.
Speaker 4 (33:14):
I'll tell you two things. One way I felt, and
this is a good way to feel when you reach
that certain age and you I felt like I reached
into my pocket and there was a whole bunch of
cardboard pieces in my pocket with flashes of color all
over them, and I just reached in my pocket. I
emptied my pockets out and I put them on a
table and I went and I put them all together.
(33:36):
It was Nashville. So every little thing that I had done,
every little piece of that, and all those years that
that rejection you got, and you know, what's that for?
I don't know that job that was a weird little job.
What's that? And all those things eventually became that. It's
just I felt so fortunate. It felt like a real
(33:57):
coming together. That example I gave of the magic behind it.
That's just one I'll tell you another I was, I've
never stopped writing music, like when I go to college.
Probably started off as more rock, more ram you twoish
when but as I started, I got married, started having kids.
You keep the station on something that the toddlers can
(34:18):
hear and right, and I started really loving that two
thousands country in nineties, early two thousands country. So just
another day in Paradise and all these things I was feeling.
And I also, to be honest, I write in a
more literal way, less metaphorical rock metaphor. I write stories,
and maybe it comes wrong with a punchline, or maybe
(34:39):
it's just ea, stop loving country. Yeah country. So we
got more and more country, and eventually, through a long
story I won't tell you, I met a Nashville songwriter,
wonderful woman named Jane Bach, and she would go back
and forth Nashville Toba. And I started writing with her
and she and I wrote six or seven songs over
these good months and they were pretty good. And so
(35:05):
she was telling me I knew what a writer's round was,
and so we actually had a writer's round out. I
think it was on cold or Kolanga. It was a
Korean barbecue place and at night we played a writer's round.
We played these songs and a bunch of people showed up. Yeah,
And at some point she said, Okay, now I want
you to come to Nashville. I want you to play
at the Bluebird Cafe. And I knew what the Bluebird Cafe,
(35:26):
and I was like done, and I bought a plane
ticket and so I'm already to go. It's on the calendar.
And then right before then I has always happened. I
got work, I got acting, and I had to do it.
So I canceled the ticket. And then a couple months
later I did it again, and I got work again,
and I literally say to my wife, when am I
ever going to get to go to Nashville. It's just
(35:46):
not going to happen, and be damn. I get the
script says Nashville. I auditioned over five times and I
get it. And my very first deacon scene was with
that guitar in the Bluebird Cafe.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
Oh my God, with the great.
Speaker 4 (36:04):
Pam Tillis singing harmonies with me and chairs at the
back of the room. Yeah, pulled low and a tear
going down her face at the sheer beauty of my song.
And I thought, what are you doing God? This is amazing.
This is amazing, And I've never stopped feeling that.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
Yeah, oh my gosh, that's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I feel like music has that you know, speaks to you.
Guys are still able to go on tour after the
show has been off for a number of years because
I feel like, and tell me if you feel this,
The music aspect of it, I think keeps the show
alive for so many people, especially in Nashville. How Nashville
uses music is beautiful. It's always organic. You're not breaking
(36:46):
into song walking down a street necessarily. It's always in
a real place where music would be heard, and it
yet and it still furthers the story in a way
that's not hitting you over the head with what's going on.
Speaker 4 (36:59):
And I so agree, I actually would I've The first
thing I found out, I want to say is the
caliber of the music that we got to do that the.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
Great t Bone absolutely excellent.
Speaker 4 (37:10):
Peon Burnette. I don't know how many Grammys he has,
but his goal for our music, what he was aspiring
to was not to imitate country radio. He said he
was He's t Bone Burnette. He says he wanted to
be more than country radio. And we have a ton
of songs that would not be on country radio. Country
radio wouldn't always work in that moment. These songs are
(37:30):
incredibly residant. We didn't have a songwriting staff. Our songwriting
staff was Nashville and all the great writers, and they
all submitted these songs, and half of them were songs
that were just maybe a little too pure, a little
too amazing to be that next thing that you know
that the world listening to. But what I always found
(37:51):
that was really incredible was, first of all, as Deacon,
I played a guy that I'm not going to tell
you much. I'm not going to say that much. You
asked me some question I don't know, I don't know,
like this podcast would not be going well. But you
put them begun guitar and he'll tell you every single thing. Yeah. Yeah,
(38:11):
And so that was on that personal level, but it's
also on the scenic level. You've already seen, you guys
know how you can reach a certain point in a
scene where narratively or where verbally you've kind of said
all you can say. But I remember there's a scene
at the Bluebird Cafe, the first one where Deacon and
(38:31):
Reina who used to be together, and then she had to,
she had to separate for her own personal well being
and her child and all. And Deacon finally got clean,
but by then it was too late. She was with
Mayor Teddy. So they have kept this perfect little distance
where he's her guitar player, she's the least singer, and
(38:51):
they kept it right. And that's how that was. And
I think it's so beautiful that when what was the
catalyst that made that all fall apart? It was Deacon
playing the Bluebird and he invited Rain along and said,
will you sing one with me? Sure? And they sit
side by side and they sing no One will ever
Love You. And it's just they just got too close
(39:13):
to the fire. Because what music can do performance and
I think songwriting itself is very much like it's very intimate.
It's almost like these two people come together, go in
the room together, warm up, you get to know each other.
I'm not going to get graphic here, Yeah, but then
there's sort of this you conceive of something. Now when
(39:38):
you leave the room, there's this third thing that wasn't
that had not been there. And that third thing, this
this child, this song is that you birth can get
lost in the wind or it can go on to
rule the world and be you know, be like I
Will Always Love You by Dolly Partners. Yeah, just the
(39:58):
power of a song. And I've never forgotten that. There's
a few songs in Nashville. There's one called A Life
That's Good and that was written by Ashley Monroe and
Sarah Siskin and it's just so real and it's almost
like I finished pretty much every show with it, and
so does the Nashville cast because it's a little bit
like a prayer. It's just saying the whole show is
(40:19):
about everybody's trying to get this fame, get that money,
and get that you know, we know that, we're all
trying to get that next job, get that next get
that get those more followers. And A Life that's Good
just talks about you only need a handful of things
to have a life that's good. And the chorus and
I sang this on a TV show two arms around me,
heaven to ground me, and a family that always calls
(40:41):
me home, four wheels to get there, enough love to share,
and a sweet, sweet song. At the end of the day, Lord,
I pray I have a life that's good, that's that
just resonates with me. Wow.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
I think that's also why country music was the perfect
genre of music to have a musical TV show because
watching it, watching that pilot, I was like, of course,
of course.
Speaker 4 (41:10):
Just literally saying the thing to her without saying the
thing to her.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
But yes, because how you were talking about, like your
songwriting country I feel like at its best, and it
can be done in a number of like subgenres. But
you also get, just in that pilot alone, your testament
to the different styles of writing. Yes, the level of
writing and the show, but country music can affect you
so quickly and easily because it's a way of distilling
(41:38):
complex emotions in a simple way that that just cuts
through I think easier and quicker than most other musical genres.
Speaker 4 (41:45):
They old praise three chords in the truth.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
There you go.
Speaker 7 (41:48):
That's what I was trying to say perfectly from that
that side of it, And no, I absolutely feel that way,
and it was it was something to see just getting
these songs.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
Getting an email of this song going you're going to
be singing this and about week yeah, and also getting
to see the other people like can you imagine when
I first heard Lennon and Mazie singing on the set
or you know what. There's a scene at the very
end of the pilot where Waddie White played by the
(42:23):
great J. D. Salther, is that the Bluebird and he's
Claire and Sam yes, and he says, listen to this
and he holds up and she's somewhere else. But you
know how it is when you shoot a show, everybody
thinks we see everything. We don't hang out on the set.
I stopped, felt really good with Connie. It felt great
at The Bluebird. But then I watched like you guys
(42:45):
did on the on that night, and when that came on,
I go, wow, what Yeah, you know, I've never understood
competitive shows like your story. This person competes I always.
I just wanted them to freaking shine, because yes, and
they did.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
And they did absolutely.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (43:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (43:04):
Two of the things real quick, I want to say.
Number one, another show is interesting. I was my buddies
at Out of Banks. Jonas Pate, especially creator of a
show that's on Amazon now called The run Arounds, and
that's about a young high school band that is making
their way and it's crazy because these guys are so
incredibly talented. They the band is writing all yeah, and
(43:28):
they're performing them live right there. So yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
I discovered them a couple of weeks ago because as
a band I thought they were I was like, wait,
it's a TV show. They're from a TV show, but
they're also just like operating as a normal band outside
of the show totally.
Speaker 4 (43:43):
I mean, yeah, it's really really impressive, and so they're
doing it again. They actually had me come in and
do a little consulting in the writer's room as the
guy that was on the show with the music and on.
That was the real lot of fun and I got
to be really impressed by them. But you want to
go back to some people, what the heck was that about?
Was the Guinness World I just want to tell you
that real quick.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Please.
Speaker 4 (44:04):
I'm somebody that doesn't you know. There's a line in
a life that's good. It says, sometimes I'm hard on
me when dreams don't come easy. I want to look
back and say I did all that I could at
the end of the day. Lord, I pray I don't
know about you guys. I have that if I look
back and say I did all that I could, I
(44:25):
can be hurt by how it all came out. But
I won't. It won't eat me up.
Speaker 2 (44:29):
Now, you tried, right, If you.
Speaker 4 (44:32):
Didn't work hard enough for that audition, if you didn't,
if you're on that show and you know you just
didn't bring it that, that's a long time to live
with that. So I started around twenty twelve on Nashville.
Around twenty sixteen, I realized that I had released like
two songs. I've been writing all this music, and I said,
(44:54):
I have no idea if this thing's going to last.
I might be back in alve next year, and I'm
going to I can go. You lived in music city
for four years, had access to every great songwriter, yeah,
great producers, great players, and that's all you did. So
I said, ah, And so I created a little bit
of a deadline machine. I went out. I remember I
(45:15):
stood in a little stream near my house and I said,
he everybody, I just want to let you know that
I am going putting out a brand new single every
Friday until that's stupid and crazy. So I and I
called it every single Friday. At it well, and I
(45:37):
completely blew through that deadline. When it was stupid, I
went right through. I thought maybe I'd get twenty songs
but by the time I finished, it was fifty four
one for fifty four weeks on spot You can go
on Spotify or Apple and see it's every single Charles
Sen every single Friday project.
Speaker 1 (46:00):
And what a cool project.
Speaker 4 (46:02):
Oh man. That remember what I said about being on
stage with Buddy. That was my masters in songwriting and
my masterduction and I learned so much. That was my
ten thousand hours.
Speaker 1 (46:13):
That's literally what I was going to say.
Speaker 4 (46:15):
That's right, yeah, And so I only bring it up
because you meant because you did mention it, and to
say that there was one more of those things where
then I felt like, Okay, now I can never say
I didn't do all that's damn sure. But it's funny
because I was definitely one of I'm an old guy.
So I was one of those kids who, growing up
(46:35):
in like the eighties, had the Guinness Book of World
Records a paperback. I would walk around with it.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
Yeah right.
Speaker 4 (46:42):
It was like I was always trying to figure out
how many times I'd have to hop on a pogo
stick or how many gone I'd have to fit in
my mouth, And in the end, I just did this
thing that I desperately loved and went for it whole hog.
And I was on the Today Show, I think, and
the Guinness people came by and said, yeah, he's ever
done that?
Speaker 2 (47:01):
Wow, that's incredible.
Speaker 3 (47:04):
Well, we ask everybody who comes on the show in
our Glear era, what is the feeling that Lee leaves
you with? So if you remiss to ask, what is
the feeling that Nashville leaves you with?
Speaker 4 (47:17):
Man, you know what's great about that guitar is it's
it's got a really rich, warm, deep tone. And those
are the words that come to my mind. Nashville itself.
It's so rich, it was so warm. The people we
(47:38):
all got along is so great, and it was so deep.
It touches people still, people because I played this guy, Deacon.
Deacon went through a lot. Deacon was a walking country song.
You know, he lost his woman, yet he drank too much.
You know, he was sick himself. And what I found
(47:59):
is there those were touch points for people. So over
the years since people come up to me and go,
I love that show, and go and you know, my
dad he was an alcoholic too, and and so I
recognized what Deacon went through and it made me feel
for my dad a little bit. There's little things that
based on that you don't know, you know atching to it,
(48:19):
so I was, that's it rich and warm.
Speaker 2 (48:23):
Indeed, I feel like we could talk to you for hours,
and you are such a good storyteller, and it's also
so nice to talk to somebody else. I can't believe
there hasn't been any more Glee like Nashville Crossover because
it's such a specific experience and a musical TV show
and I know we speak that same language.
Speaker 4 (48:44):
Having there must have been something for you guys too,
I mean, because there was nothing remotely like it, so
like you had, nobody had quite gone before. I mean,
cop Rock had been.
Speaker 2 (48:55):
Like exactly a long time.
Speaker 4 (48:58):
It really wasn't this. Yeah, And that's and once again
the other thing, like you say, casting, that's just don't
much have it when you go people, it's it's not
that easy to go, hey, here's the show, here's what
we're going to do, not cast it.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Yeah, that's right. But hearing your stories makes me feel
warm because it reminds me and I'm sure Jenna feels
the same way. That just reminds me of our Glee family.
And I love that you know, that experience was that
for all of you and because it's such a special
thing to be a part of a show that probably
(49:32):
shouldn't work. Musicals on TV just hadn't really worked. And
when you get to do it in a way that
is touching so many lives, it's more than you could
ever wish for getting a job right like on a
TV show, it's touching people, like you said, And so
I'm just.
Speaker 4 (49:48):
Not that there's not struggles either, not bec there's sometimes
this between people feeling things and wanting to bring it
across and no.
Speaker 2 (49:57):
But your family and you get into it.
Speaker 4 (49:59):
And even with the network like network probably always wanted
a little bit more of a uh something uh scandal
or something away with murder, or about the ambition of
it all and about the crazy storylines that you need
to bring to bring that next pow pow. But I
(50:20):
think it's funny thing is we did six seasons that
and crazy things happen as they do in town, but
nobody remembers them. Everybody remembers the little moments between Gunner
and in Scarlett, or between a Starlett and Deacon, or
between Deacon and Maddie his daughters. It's the pressure, little
truthful moments that you got it it's almost like you
(50:43):
have to pay for them with this vision. I mean,
what's the classic thing with the famous actors. They say
one for them, one for me. Right, It's almost like
there are scenes you feel sometimes like, Okay, this is
this is from.
Speaker 2 (50:58):
That's exactly right, Yeah, exactly right.
Speaker 1 (51:01):
You get it, you get it.
Speaker 4 (51:04):
Well.
Speaker 1 (51:04):
We are so grateful.
Speaker 3 (51:05):
Thank you so much for taking the time to come
and chat with us. It's really wonderful and we are
just so in all of your body of work, but
also just like the approach you take to life, and
that really speaks to your career and what you've accomplished
and what you'll continue to accomplish.
Speaker 4 (51:21):
So thank you so much, incredibly kind, and you guys
are great at this. I can see why you're doing this,
and we're all very much that you turned your gaze
over to Nashville and you know it.
Speaker 2 (51:31):
Oh, I'm so happy. We have to stop ourselves from
just being in Nashville show because look, I will tell you,
I grew up in Texas. I didn't love country music.
I was sort of probably because I was around all
the time. I was like anti country music, and I
don't know. By the end of that pilot I was like,
(51:51):
of course, of course, obviously. Yeah, but by the end
of that pilot, I was like, I am in.
Speaker 4 (52:00):
I didn't like country music before, and I mean, that's
about the kindest thing you could ever get.
Speaker 2 (52:03):
Yeah, that's the biggest comment. Exactly right, exactly, Yeah, contact
after forty minutes.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (52:11):
Thank you for to see you on tour.
Speaker 4 (52:14):
No, that'd be fantastic. Yeah, well we come to the
rhyme and that's in January, and otherwise coming over to
the UK.
Speaker 2 (52:20):
Amazing. Oh great, we'll make to see you in person soon.
Thank you for your reach out.
Speaker 4 (52:26):
If you guys come to Nashville.
Speaker 2 (52:27):
Seriously, definitely, definitely.
Speaker 4 (52:31):
Please.
Speaker 2 (52:31):
I've never been. I want to come there.
Speaker 4 (52:33):
Bro. Yeah yea, well you've seen the places we shot
in him, so it'll be good. All right.
Speaker 2 (52:38):
Thanks, thank you so much, worse, thank you. What a man,
what a man, gosh, I mean, just insane.
Speaker 3 (52:49):
We have him back, so kind, so talented, so just
a good all around human I mean. And also we
love Nashville. Kevin loves Nashville. Now let it let it
be known.
Speaker 2 (53:04):
The record show. And also this is why you get hired.
He's so kind, so thoughtful.
Speaker 3 (53:09):
Yeah, well, I hope you guys enjoyed that conversation. Thank
you so much to Charles for joining us and chatting
all about his amazing life experience and his career in Nashville.
I hope you guys enjoyed that.
Speaker 2 (53:21):
And go watch Nashville on Netflix. Go see them on
tour starting in January. Yeah, yeah, and that's what you
really miss Thanks for listening, and follow us on Instagram
at and that's what you really miss pod. Make sure
to write us a review and leave us five stars.
See you next time.
Host
Jenna Ushkowitz
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The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!