Country Singers Who Scored Surprise Scripted TV Roles: From Morgan Wade to Jelly Roll

Yana GrebenyukWed, April 22, 2026 at 12:31 AM UTC

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Dutton Ranch's Morgan Wade isn't the only country singer to make the transition to scripted TV roles.

Jelly Roll played a scene-stealing character on season 3 of Fire Country, marking his acting debut. Fire Country star — and executive producer — Max Thieriot later told Us Weekly that he "reached out first" to Jelly Roll after crossing paths at the CMT Music Awards.

"He was finishing drying his hands with a towel in the bathroom at the CMTs [in April 2024]. I ran into him in the bathroom straight up at the CMT Music Awards," he recalled in 2025. "I said, 'Thank you for letting us have some of your songs on the show.' And he's like, 'Dude, how do I get on the show? I've been petitioning online and talking to my people and you got to get me on that show.' He said Fire Country is what he really represents. ... He called me the next day and it showed how sincere he was."

Thieriot credited Jelly Roll for being so collaborative.

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"We worked on coming up with a character [for him] that we all thought would be interesting, unique and special and still. It tells some of the story about second chances and what he really represents," he noted to Us. "But [it] also feels different from who he is and how people see him day to day as a country singer."

He concluded, "I don't know [if we will have more country singers]. I have to wait for the next awards show and I'm just going to set up a chair in the bathroom to start greeting them as they come in. But there's a few that we've been talking with for a while now. Honestly, it would be fun to maybe see both [Kane and Jelly Roll] bring their characters back in some form."

The Yellowstone spinoff Marshals also recruited country music star Riley Green, who appeared in several April 2026 episodes as a former Navy SEAL.

"It happened really organically. It was through Luke Grimes, who's become a real good buddy of mine," he told People in March 2026 about how his role on the show came to be. "He's starting his music career and was starting to come to Nashville and doing some cowriting and stuff. I was trying to help him out in that world a little bit with some people that I knew. He was like, 'Man, you should try acting, you know? I think you'd be good at it.' I was already kind of putting thought into that."

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After meeting with an acting coach, Green was taught not to "worry so much about the lines" and instead focus on responding "to what the other person says." Green also teased how his character has "a lot of vulnerability," in addition to his extensive military experience.

"He'd been through a lot and had a lot of problems and that's not the easiest thing to just jump into," Green noted. "I certainly think there would have been characters that would have been easier for me to sort of tap into that were more similar to me."

Keep scrolling for more country singers who booked a scripted TV role:

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Morgan Wade

Paramount+ announced in April 2026 that Morgan Wade joined the cast in a recurring role. She will play a "bartender at the local watering hole in Rio Paloma, Texas, who sees all."

Riley Green

Riley Green plays former Navy SEAL Garrett on Marshals, who arrives at the ranch hoping to lean on his friends Kayce Dutton (Luke Grimes) and Cal (Logan Marshall-Green) to help “put the demons of his past to rest," according to his official character description.

Jelly Roll

Sergei Bachlakov/CBS

CBS fans were in for a fun surprise when Jelly Roll made an appearance on Fire Country in April 2025, where he was introduced as healthcare worker and former convict Noah. His song "Dreams Don't Die" was also played during the episode, which marked the musician's first scripted role after he previously made a cameo as himself on Paramount+'s Tulsa King.

Tim McGraw and Faith Hill

Tim McGraw as James and Faith Hill as Margaret in '1883.' Emerson Miller/Paramount+

The beloved country pair played fictional couple James and Margaret Dutton in the Yellowstone prequel series 1883, which ran from 2021 to 2022.

Kane Brown

Sergei Bachlakov/CBS

The country singer made an appearance in the first season of Fire Country playing a train hopper named Robin. After a train collided with a party bus, Robin helped the Three Rock crew evacuate the victims and handed Bode a bag full of cash before the police arrived.

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”