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If she wasn’t already one of the biggest female stars in country music history, Reba McEntire, 69, might be known simply for her acting. The same kind of down-home sparkle she gave 25 No. 1 country hits you can see in the dozens of stage, screen and TV roles she’s had over the years — including six seasons of the sitcom Reba, still popular in reruns.
She returns to the comedy world in her new NBC sitcom Happy’s Place (debuting Oct. 18), reuniting her with her Reba costar Melissa Peterman, 53, and executive producer Kevin Abbott. Her new role comes at a time when she’s already on network TV four hours a week, serving her third consecutive stint as judge on The Voice, where she took Blake Shelton’ spinning seat.
All this just a year after she played a key role in the ABC series Big Sky and starred as a circuit judge in the Lifetime movie The Hammer.
McEntire shared her thoughts about acting, music and more with AARP.
You're so busy. You have this new sitcom, Happy’s Place, you had an album out last year, you were touring last year, and you're still on The Voice. How do you fit it all together?
A lot of great scheduling from my team, making sure I'm at the right place at the right time, and I show up, and have a great time.
Why do you do all these things at the same time?
Well, I was kind of slowing down. And then the opportunities were available, and when they said, “Do you want to do it?” I’m like, “Oh yeah,” I see an opportunity to have fun, meet new people. Like, back on The Voice this year, I knew Gwen Stefani [55] from the first season, she and I are great friends, but to meet and hang out with Snoop Dogg [52] and Michael Bublé [49] — you can't imagine how much fun that is. It’s hysterical.
And you hear a wide variety of music on The Voice — does that help you in your recording career?
Oh, that helps me tremendously. Yeah, they'll be saying, “Okay, I'm going to do a so-and-so song.” I’ll say, “Who's that?” “Oh, you don't know her music? You gotta go check her out.” So I get on Spotify and check them out. It's been a huge education. Because I can say, "Let's write a song like this one, because I like this thought."
Do you compartmentalize your time on the sitcom and your music career, or do you try to fit everything together?
It's a juggling act really, because of The Voice and the sitcom being filmed at the same time, we’re juggling a little bit, so when we can fit music in, because you have to do that so far in advance because of venues. So we're playing it by ear right now to see how everything goes.
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