Nashville Rebel (film)
| Nashville Rebel | |
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Promotional poster
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| Directed by | Jay J. Sheridan |
| Produced by | Fred A. Niles |
| Written by | Ira Kerns Jay J. Sheridan |
| Starring | |
| Music by | Robert Blanford |
| Distributed by | American International Pictures |
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Release date
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Running time
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95 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Nashville Rebel is a 1966 motion picture starring Waylon Jennings, Mary Frann, Gordon Oas-Heim, and CeCe Whitney. This should not be confused with a 2006 compilation DVD of TV performances released by RCA Records to accompany the four-disc "Nashville Rebel" anthology.
Arlin Grove (Jennings) has just finished a hitch in the Army and finds he's stranded in the small town of Morgan's Corner after being robbed by drunken rednecks. Grove is taken in by pretty Molly Morgan (Mary Frann) and her father, and it doesn't take long for Molly to become infatuated with the rugged stranger while nursing him back to health.
Arlin and Molly soon marry, and after playing a few songs at a local honky-tonk, Grove becomes a professional musician when he's offered 75 dollars a week for a standing Saturday night gig. Word about Grove begins to spread, and entertainment lawyer Wesley Lang (Gordon Oas-Heim) offers to take over his management and take him to the big time. Lang's paramour Margo (CeCe Whitney) helps give Arlin's act some polish, and before long the singer is knocking 'em dead on the country circuit, and even playing the Grand Ole Opry.
Lang takes it upon himself to break up Arlin and Molly's marriage, convinced it would be better for Grove's career if he were single, and Molly, now expecting a baby, is left heartbroken. Arlin soon finds himself of the other side of Lang's machinations when the manager wrongly suspects his new client is having an affair with Margo; Lang sabotages Grove with a booking at a ritzy supper club, and thinking his career is over, Grove turns to the bottle. An apologetic Margo consoles Arlin, and helps him get back to Molly. (Special thanks to Mark Deming, AMG)
While the film was a modest success, this would be the only movie which featured Waylon Jennings as a lead actor. Waylon himself stated in his autobiography (1994, Warner Books) that his performances were not as good as they could have been, and cautioned fans against seeing the film. Eventually, Waylon stopped playing "Green River" (released as a single by RCA) in his live performances.
Several years later, the film's title would prove prophetic: Waylon (with others) was openly rebelling against Nashville's producer-oriented approach to recording. Ironically, the film was pulled from distribution in the mid-1970s, and despite the upsurge in Waylon's popularity in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Nashville Rebel would neither be seen on TV nor be officially released on video until the mid-1990s.
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