Shane McAnally Talks The Gift Of ‘Shucked’ [Interview]

/by

Shane McAnally

Shucked, the Tony Award-winning musical created by Nashville icons Shane McAnally and Brandy Clark, has begun its run at Nashville’s Tennessee Performing Arts Center (TPAC).

After captivating audiences at the Nederlander Theatre on Broadway, the show—celebrated for its sharp humor and heartwarming storytelling—will play at TPAC through Nov. 10, marking the start of its North American tour.

Shane McAnally, Brandy Clark. Photo: Emilio Madrid

With a book by Tony Award winner Robert Horn, music by Clark and McAnally, and direction by three-time Tony Award winner Jack O’Brien, Shucked delivers a comedic tale centered around corn, proving that sometimes tearing down walls, rather than building them, is the only way to preserve what matters.

In celebration of this milestone, MusicRow spoke with McAnally, who reflected on the creative success he and Clark achieved with Shucked after working on the project for over a decade.

“The first preview on Broadway, which happened a month before opening night, was an out-of-body experience. I’ve never felt a feeling like that. We were sitting next to each other on the balcony, Brandy and I, and when Alex Newell sang ‘Independently Owned’ and the audience got on their feet, I looked at Brandy and said, ‘I don’t feel like I’m on the ground.’ I’ll spend the rest of my life chasing that.”

The show’s impact resonated widely, earning nine Tony Awards nominations in 2023, and Newell, who played Lulu, won Best Featured Actor In A Musical. The musical also earned 12 Drama Desk Awards nominations and won two, with McAnally and Clark taking home Outstanding Music and Newell winning Outstanding Featured Performance In A Musical. The cast album later earned a Grammy nomination.

The brilliance of Shucked lies in its ability to weave profound meaning into a story that’s outrageously funny.

“I’ve always leaned towards humor, even in the saddest of times. I think gay people, by nature, lean on humor to mask pain or garner acceptance, so I’ve always considered myself a funny person,” McAnally says. “But what happens in a theater of people is that they all of a sudden realize that they’re laughing at the humanity—they’re laughing because they can relate. It doesn’t matter who you’re sitting next to or your differences, when it comes to laughter, it’s universal.”

McAnally says that it was easy to observe audience members soaking in the message of Shucked after they’ve delighted in a side-splitting laugh.

“People are disarmed when they’re laughing. They don’t have their guard up. They open up, and then you have the opportunity to get in there.”

Alex Newell as Lulu in Shucked at the Nederlander Theatre in New York City. Photo: Emilio Madrid

Another charm of Shucked is its playful embrace of country culture. While it’s not the first country-inspired musical to succeed on Broadway—think Oklahoma! or Annie Get Your Gun—seeing polished theater professionals romp around in a show about corn brings a refreshing, lighthearted break in a time of growing divides.

McAnally, a Texas native, shares how he sometimes clarified southern expressions and country dialects during rehearsals.

“A lot of these actors went to Berkeley or Juilliard, so even if they’re from the south, they’ve had it beaten out of them,” he says. “There are compromises in there. There are things that would not fly in the country litmus test, but we found a middle ground so that people that loved Broadway didn’t feel completely outside of the music. It had to be accessible for both crowds and I think we got that.”

Reflecting on the parallels between the theater world and Music Row, McAnally notes some similarities.

“It’s like Music Row in that the odds are not in your favor,” McAnally says with a laugh. “Just like making it in country music, you have to have a lot of faith, but you also have to have some naivety, because if you know too much, you wouldn’t do it. If we had known the true odds when Brandy and I got into it, we wouldn’t have done it.

“It’s a miracle that this thing went to Broadway and now is getting to tour,” he adds. “We’re so blessed. Yes, the material is wonderful, but there’s a lot of great material out there that just doesn’t get its chance.”

Now, bringing Shucked to Nashville, McAnally feels immense gratitude.

“I cannot wait to be in Nashville sitting among not just people that are in the industry and love country music, but just true southerners who want to see how we brought the worlds together. Hopefully, we did it justice and make people proud. I know that we did, and I’m ready for everybody that didn’t have the chance to go to New York to be able see it.”

Tickets remain available for Shucked‘s multi-night run in Nashville.

LB Cantrell
Latest posts by LB Cantrell (see all)