Laura Bell Bundy goes from Broadway star to country queen

We continue our daily look at this year’s USA WEEKEND Breakthrough Video of the Year nominees with Laura Bell Bundy, one of the four acts up for the CMT Award come June 9. Award accolades are nothing new for the Kentucky native, though: In her previous life as a Broadway star, Bundy was nominated in 2007 for the leading actress Tony, honoring her lead role in Legally Blonde: The Musical. Now two albums in as a country singer — her latest, Achin’ and Shakin’, was released in April — Bundy has found a video hit in the colorful, Wild West-tinged Giddy On Up. “This video is what broke me – not radio. There’s a special place it has in my heart,” Bundy says. Read below for a Q&A with the country starlet, check out the video for Giddy On Up, and if you like it — or any of the other nominees — let your voice be heard at cmt.com by June 8.

Photos by Michael Elins

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Congrats on your CMT nomination. Is that almost as exciting as a Tony nomination?
[Laughs] Probably pretty equal. It’s different when you’re getting a Tony nomination for an entire body of work as opposed to just getting a nomination for a video.

Was it as fun making the video as it seems?
Yeah, it really was. I had the idea for Giddy On Up soon after writing the song. I wanted to do a Western theme and have what I call the Jerry Reed rap, where I wanted to combine clogging and hip-hop together. At the beginning, I kept thinking of Dolly Parton in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.

You have several costume changes. Which was your favorite?
I like the chaps the best. The aqua costume was so tight that I could barely move. [Laughs] I was wearing a vintage piece, and I wanted it to look like a Mae West outfit and really look old as opposed to looking modern. I wanted the back half of the video to be more modern.

Now you know how women in the Wild West felt.
Right, when they had to wear corsets and stuff! Whew! I tried to do a split on a wooden bar — that didn’t work. I was either going to bust the back of the corset or bust my leg. I got my high heels caught and it took a huge chunk of wood out of the bar.

Did you have much dance experience before you got into musical theater?
I started dance class when I was about 3 years old in Kentucky, and then I took a break when I was in high school because I wanted to run track and play soccer. I loved running track and stuff, but those couple of years I missed might have been important to me. At this point, it doesn’t really matter, but I’ve always loved dancing.

Which was your first love: musical theater or country music?
Music in general and just entertaining. When you’re a kid, you’re not really genre-specific. You love singing and you love dancing and you love running around the house. My mom listened to a lot, but that was at a younger age more of an influence than musical theater. I got into musical theater when I was a little bit older and I saw my first Broadway show and I became interested in that, too. I like to tell stories in the most entertaining way possible, and you can accompany those stories with music and dancing and jokes and stuff like that. You can do that in musical theater, but I’m also figuring out that you can do that in this genre, too. I like doing it this way better actually because I don’t write the songs when I do Broadway shows and I have a vested interest.

Does the Broadway experience and acting help when it comes to stepping on a music video set?
Absolutely. I’m aware of what’s going to come across on screen. I’m really hands-on in regards to my videos – the last two videos I did, I conceptualized and then worked with the director to make it better. Having the experience of musical theater and being able to tell a story in that way on stage helps me with my videos and to take chances and be more creative.

How does it feel being a rising queen of country music?
It’s surreal and amazingm and I feel lucky and blessed and grateful and all that kind of stuff. But it’s also been constant work. So it’s exhilarating and exhausting. It’s almost like you’re on a bit of a runaway train. You have to keep looking forward, because if you look back, you get left behind. But it’s everything I ever wanted, and when that’s happening, you don’t care how exhausted you get.

Do you envision a big tour, maybe in the fall?
Oh yeah. I envision a tour that’s way more expensive than I’m gonna be able to afford. [Laughs] I want to do concerts that are just as entertaining as a Broadway show, and hopefully create an experience for someone instead of them just going to see a concert.