Charles Esten: ‘Nashville reboot will be more about the music’

Nashville will be more music orientated when it moves to Country Music Television (CMT), Charles Esten has confirmed.
The actor stars as Deacon Claybourne in the much loved country music drama. The series was axed by ABC in May (16), but was then picked up by CMT, giving the show’s stars a chance to explore their characters even more.
When it returns to the small screen on 5 January (17), Charles has promised fans it will be more about the music than the soap-style personal dramas it centred on for previous episodes.
“We’re getting to spend a little more time with the songs. Some of the plots won’t be quite as accelerated, or there won’t be quite as many incidents, as (executive producer) Marshall (Herskovitz) has said it,” he told Entertainment Tonight. “What that means is we’re getting more time within the scenes.”
Charles is well aware of just how unusual it is for a series to be given a second chance once it has been dropped, and he adds the cast are all determined to make the reboot a success.
“We all knew how much we loved the show, but when you lose it for a little bit, when you get it back, I think everybody looks at each other a little differently now,” he said. “We know how special it is and how special we’re gonna make it.
“I never thought we were done telling the stories, that we were done singing the songs. And apparently, CMT agreed.”
The 22-episode fifth season will further explore the story between Deacon and Connie Britton’s character Rayna James, and Charles teased a scene he recently shot with the flame-haired actress.
“I had a scene with Connie the other day where it was really nice, because it has this nice lyrical pace,” he said. “It was just Deacon and Rayna together in a room talking about – I won’t say what – but it was those moments where we got to be a whole lot and be with each other and then (we went to) the next scene.
“In other seasons, we might have gone somewhere else in something a little more heightened. (Here) it was still us and we were continuing the conversation. It was real filmic, like we started out in the very beginning. I love everything we’ve done across all the seasons, but this is going to be a very special one.”