Anna Daniels
The first thing you need to know about Charles Esten is that, while he’s an accomplished actor with an impressive résumé, he’s also a singer-songwriter of some renown, with a slew of country-tinged singles currently available on Spotify. Luckily for Esten, those two worlds collided in 2012, when he landed a small-screen role that also required him sing and play music on ABC’s and CMT’s beloved music city set drama series Nashville.
If you were among Nashville‘s fiercely loyal fanbase over the course of its six-season run, Esten likely needs no introduction. That’s even more true the character he played, country crooner Deacon Clayborne. Esten appeared as Deacon in no fewer than 124 episodes of Nashville between 2012 and 2018, and was a featured player throughout, particularly due to his character’s professional and romantic entanglements with series star Connie Britton‘s Rayna Jaymes. Though Deacon tended to operate largely in the shadows of the more famous folks around him on Nashville, Esten was more or less the most legit leading man the show had in its small screen run. He more than delivered the goods during his time in the Nashville spotlight, giving a frequently scene-stealing performance as Deacon that was every bit as charming and charismatic as it often was emotionally devastating.
Written by: Looper
