THERE’S more than one TV exec out there kicking themselves for poo-poohing Reba McEntire when she tried pitching a network series about three years ago.
Had they known that McEntire’s new WB sitcom, “Reba,” would be one of this season’s biggest surprises, they surely would have played their cards differently.
“I had gone to L.A. about two-and-a half-years ago to pursue a sitcom career; I had this idea and went to the networks, show runners, directors and writers – but no one was interested,” says McEntire, calling in after appearing on “The View.”
“I just thought then that it wasn’t meant to be.”
Maybe it wasn’t, but it is now. “Reba” has proved to be a solid Friday-night hit for The WB, regularly winning its timeslot (9-9:30 p.m.) and already being picked up for the entire season.
Along with “Smallville,” “Raising Dad” and “Maybe It’s Me,” “Reba” has more-than-compensated for the loss of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” which moved to rival UPN this season.
It’s also turned McEntire, the renowned country singer and Broadway star (“Annie Get Your Gun”) into a bona fide TV star.
“I went into the TV series the same way I went into ‘Annie’ – with no expectations,” says McEntire in her thick Oklahoma drawl. “I was just going to have fun and do the best job I possibly could.”
Maybe the reason that “Reba” works is because it plays to McEntire’s strengths.
In the show, McEntire plays Reba Hart, a divorced Texas soccer mom with the requisite dysfunctional family.
There’s the dentist-husband who’s run off with his hygienist; a daughter pregnant by the dumb high-school jock; a nasty 12-year-old daughter; and a 9-year-old-son who’s oblivious to just about everything.
“Everything just clicked when I got the script last September,” says McEntire. “The character [of Reba] fit my personality, my way of speaking, my dialect – and the timing was right for me coming out of ‘Annie.’
McEntire says the script she shopped around Hollywood three years ago was “totally different” than what The WB had in mind for her.
“That show was about what happens after a country-music show, everything that happens backstage, life on the bus, etc.,” she says.
Now that she’s starring in a network series, McEntire says she pays a lot of attention to the nuts-and-bolts of the TV industry – namely ratings.
“I definitely care about that,” she says. “I make the call first thing Saturday morning to see how we did the night before.
“But I’m having fun and I love the people I get to to work with,” she says. “When you’re lucky to be in a workplace where you like everyone, that’s everything.”