‘Nashville’ returns featuring trans actor playing trans character
Country music series ‘Nashville’ is to return this week featuring a transgender actor in a trans role.
Trans actor Jen Richards was last year cast in a recurring role in the drama Nashville.
Richards, who is also an activist for trans rights, will play the role of Allyson Del Lago.
The physical therapist character will appear in the upcoming fifth season.
She will be tasked with helping one of the main characters through a difficult challenged, reports the Hollywood Reporter.
“We wanted to explore the diversity of music that’s going on in Nashville,” showrunner Marshall Herskovitz said.
“To bring in people of different ethnicities and from different backgrounds just felt important.”
“I only get called in for trans roles and then I lose those parts to men because they think I look too much like a regular girl to play a trans part,” Richards said of being cast.
Being cast in the role means Richard represents the first out trans actor on the network, as well as the first transgender character.
The hit series was brought back by Hulu and CMT back in June after ABC cancelled the show after four seasons.
The new season will premiere on 5 January on CMT.
The country music drama is co-produced by Lionsgate, ABC Studios and Opry Entertainment.
Richards was nominated for an Emmy for writing, producing and co-creating the digital series ‘Her Story’. She previously starred in Violet, set in Los Angeles it featured the star as a trans woman who deals with her own same-sex attraction.
She was also featured in I Am Cait on E! which followed the trans Olympian Caitlyn Jenner’s story.
