Reba McEntire Revealed Memorizing Lines for Acting Was ‘Really, Really Hard’ for Her: ‘There Wasn’t a Melody’
According to Reba McEntire, memorizing lines for acting projects was initially more challenging than remembering the lyrics to her songs. The process was “really, really hard” for the country music icon because there was no melody to follow.
McEntire explained how she overcame the hurdle to nail her various roles through the years. And she even dished on her most recent and “totally different” part, which found her opposite fellow actor and her real-life boyfriend, Rex Linn.
Reba McEntire was born to sing, but she also likes acting
In McEntire’s autobiography, Reba: My Story, she touched on her childhood on a cattle ranch in Oklahoma. Growing up, she once thought she might be a champion barrel racer at the rodeo, but she was also a natural-born performer.
Once her singing career took off, she put most of her eggs in that basket. However, she’d also dreamed of being an actor, which she’s explored since making her feature film debut — and proving she could get dirty as a rugged character — in Tremors.
Since then, she’s not only starred in a sitcom, Reba, but she was also on Broadway in Annie Get Your Gun. And who could forget her cameo in The Little Rascals? She even had the role of Molly Brown in Titanic for a time, though circumstances changed, and Kathy Bates ended up stepping in.
Reba McEntire said it was ‘really, really hard’ to memorize lines when she first started acting
For McEntire, memorizing songs came naturally, though she said she still forgets the words to her tunes “all the time.”
But mastering a part for acting was a different story. “When I first started to have to memorize lines that didn’t rhyme, and there wasn’t a melody, that was really, really hard,” she shared (per Forbes).
She said that she would “try to hum along to something and try to associate, and then … went with the first letter of that word to cut to this next word.”
It was a process, but McEntire eventually got it down. And she doesn’t think she’s the only person who’s found remembering lines to be a slight hurdle.
“I just had to train myself like I did with singing and memorizing songs,” she shared. “But I think the memorization is the hardest part for me, which I’d say it’s the hardest part for everybody.”
Reba McEntire is having ‘an absolute blast’ acting in a darker role on ‘Big Sky: Deadly Trails’
McEntire is currently starring on ABC’s Big Sky: Deadly Trails along with Linn and Jensen Ackles. Without giving too much away, some viewers might not know what to think of her mysterious character, Sunny, who is, let’s say, a defensive mother.
But that’s why the “Fancy” singer liked her. “That’s what drew me into the whole thing, is [that], she’s an interesting person. She’s very protective and loving,” McEntire explained (per Forbes). “She’s working really hard to hold it all together.”
She added, “That’s something totally different than anything I’ve ever played before, and I love the depth of it. I like that she is more than three‑dimensional. She’s very friendly and then she can get very dark.”
McEntire said the change of pace is “so much fun” for her and noted, “I absolutely am having a blast.”
