Connie Britton and Taylor Kitsch on the “Grief” of Leaving ‘Friday Night Lights’

In Reunited, Awards Insider hosts a conversation between two Emmy contenders who have collaborated on a previous project.

Taylor Kitsch starts off his Zoom call with Connie Britton by giving her a virtual tour of his home in Bozeman, Montana, where he moved in 2021. He’s standing outside on the deck, pointing out the Bridger mountain range in the distance and some of his favorite hikes.

American Primeval earlier this year, playing an elusive mountain man in the American West in 1857.

Britton, who got two Emmy noms for Friday Night Lights, went on to earn more Emmy attention for American Horror Story: Murder House, the musical drama Nashville, and the first season of The White Lotus. Her latest work was done opposite Robert De Niro in the gripping political drama Zero Day.

Here, Kitsch and Britton look back at what they learned from making Friday Night Lights, discuss whether they’ll show up in the upcoming reboot, and reveal which projects they consider to be “the one that got away.”

Vanity Fair: How did Friday Night Lights shape your careers?

Connie Britton: That show just set the bar for what I wanted my creative worklife to be in terms of how we worked and what our values were. I think I learned a lot from the structure that [series developer] Pete [Berg] created for all of us. We really created an ideal of what a great working environment is, right?

Taylor Kitsch: A hundred percent. It’s like a catch-22, though, because it spoiled us. On one hand, it was a crash course for me. Then right after that, I went on to this Marvel movie, which is nothing but marks and “hit your line.”

Britton: And that’s what I loved about Friday Night Lights—we never shot on a soundstage. Every house was that character’s house.

Kitsch: It was funny because I remember, and I bet you could say the same—at the Riggins house, it was the ultimate comfort zone. And then when I would go to the Taylor house, it was just such a different feel.

Britton: I didn’t even want to go to your house because everybody said there were maggots there.

Kitsch: [Laughs] It was true.

Britton: I was scared of going to your house because it’s disgusting. But meanwhile, for me, the Taylor house was home. Every single time we had a scene in the kitchen or a cooking scene, we really made it. Kyle [Chandler] always cooked the bacon, and everybody in the crew got to eat bacon. Everything that was happening there was happening in real time. There was no greenroom or going back to the trailer. I would change my clothes for the next scene in the bathroom in our bedroom. It was just like home.

Kitsch: A pet peeve of mine is when directors will try and direct you before you take a swing, before you show them what you think the scene is or where you’re at. And on FNL, that’s the seed that was planted; we never really got direction until a few takes.

Britton: It was all about trust.

Have either of you watched the show recently?

Kitsch: No. God, it’s been—I can’t even remember [the last time I watched it].

Britton: Yeah, me neither. But [Britton’s son] Yoby is 14 now. And now so many parents are coming up to me like, “Oh my gosh, we’re watching Friday Night Lights with our kid. We love it so much.” He could watch the show. I think he would love it. Is it weird? I don’t know. Maybe we’ll watch it.

When the show ended, how did you decide what to do next?

Kitsch: The beauty of that show is, one, we were getting told every other day it’s getting canceled, so you never took it for granted. But also it was like a cultish following, so you were’’t pigeonholed. You had to be a little wary of getting a lot of offers for high school football, Southern guys, but it wasn’t like an ER show. It’s really tough to come out of those. So you had the best of both worlds, where you’re garnering some respect as an actor on this acclaimed show, and then it was kind of up to you.

Britton: I actually remember coming off the show and having this almost grief, because I loved the show so much. It was kind of like, Where do you go now? We had to remind each other that this is the way we want to work, and we’re not going to settle for less than that. That was a high bar. But I remember thinking that I had to try to find something that feels challenging or outside the box, or just different enough that I’m not going to be missing Tami Taylor all the time. That definitely influenced a lot of my decisions coming out of it: American Horror Story, Nashville. It was all things that were going to challenge me in a really different way.

There’s a planned reboot. Have either of you been in conversations for that?

Kitsch: I’ve talked to Pete and [FNL showrunner] [Jason] Katims about it. I’m just so happy where I am. I don’t feel I have much to say for Riggins or to reignite that whole thing, so I won’t be a part of it. But I do know that they’re moving forward, or trying to move forward, in some manner. I think they’re going to do a great job. I’ll be the first one in line to watch. But in regard to being a part of it, I told Pete—and I bet you, Connie, would say the same—I would come in for a little bit of a funny arc or something, but I don’t think I would want to just full-stop go into three seasons of that.

Britton: Yeah, it would have to be a real little tight cameo. Same.

Taylor, you’ve worked with Peter Berg often, including on American Primeval. How do those conversations start?

Kitsch: With American Primeval, I was up on the property in Montana and I was coming down the mountain, and he called me. So you let it try and happen as naturally as possible. He’s always one to take risks, and these are very character-driven stories. But we’re like brothers, man. There’s days that we want to kill each other; then there’s days where there’s so much love there on set, and we’re just reminiscing about FNL right before we hit camera. For my death scene in Primeval, he’s just like, “Isn’t this fucking crazy?” And I’m like, “What are you talking about?” And he’s like, “We’ve been doing this 20-plus years now.” So it’s been an incredible journey with him.

Connie, what made you say yes to Zero Day?

Britton: That was [Robert] De Niro. It’s funny because Zero Day is not necessarily the kind of thing that I feel made for. But especially playing somebody like the chief of staff to the president, I wanted to see how many levels I can find to that kind of character. Really, it was because of that cast and just getting to work with amazing people. That’s one of the big takeaways from Friday Night Lights, just how much I’m always learning from the people that I work with.

How much research and prep did you need to do to feel ready to take on these roles?

Kitsch: I went down to Wind River, on the Shoshone reservation, and chatted with the elders there and asked for permission. They were amazing with me. And then we had some great advisers. Learning that dialect is very tough, but I loved it. You’re always trying to learn, even on the go—and especially with Pete’s process, where he is just throwing stuff at you. But I don’t know if there’s an “aha” moment. There’s a lot of moments where I’m like, Fuck, I’m glad I learned this. But there’s never like, Oh, I’m good. Do you feel the same?

Britton: Totally. There was a scene in Friday Night Lights where I had to talk to my daughter, played by Aimee Teegarden, about sex. I remember trying to prepare for it that day and being like, I have no idea what I would be doing in this situation. I am so completely clueless. I am not a mother. I don’t know how to have this conversation. And it was [Jeffrey] Reiner directing, and he pulls Aimee off to the side. She comes back and we do the scene again, and she starts laughing at me. He directed her to laugh at me, because of course I was already feeling insecure about the scene. It hit me so hard and it completely shifted my performance. That scene ended up being this scene that so many people come up and talk to me about.

Do you think it would be harder to break out on a show like Friday Night Lights today, then figure out what to do next?

Kitsch: I’m glad we didn’t have social media. I didn’t know what a critic was at the time. The first season, I never read anything.

Britton: No, we never did. It was so nice shooting in Austin too, because we didn’t feel like anybody was watching us.

Kitsch: It may be a little bit more of an uphill battle because of social media. If you tend to get on there and listen to that, your own hype or your own heat, it can be a dangerous slope, I think.

Britton: That’s all about projection. Friday Night Lights was nothing about projection. It was all about reality, what’s happening between these people and in this small town and this community. Social media has turned everything into this circus.

Kitsch: Honestly, if you’re so exposed, I just think you have more work as an actor the next time we see you to convince your audience. So that’s tough too.

Do either of you have a role that got away?

Britton: Well, I have a new one and an old one. My old one is Jerry Maguire. I ended up meeting with Cameron Crowe and Jim Brooks, and I did an audition, and Cameron was like, “Oh my gosh, you just showed us how this role is supposed to be played.” The studio was like, “We don’t see it.” Anyway, cut to a six-month period of them maybe making offers to people who are famous, and then it’s just, like, this long period where I’m kind of like the person to beat. I did the table read; they flew me to New York, I read with Tom Cruise. After that, still more time passes. And then they were like, “Okay, well, they want you to screen test. It’s just going to be you and this other girl that was also just in this independent movie called Renée Zellweger.” My screen test, I know, was terrible. It might’ve been the first time I had ever been on a set. Didn’t get the part, by the way—in case you didn’t know. So that was a heartbreak because I love that part.

And then my most recent one, which is not really the one that got away: My agents sent me The Residence, and I know Shonda [Rhimes] a bit. I just thought it was such a genius script. I emailed Shonda and I’m like, “I could be so great.” And Shonda was like, “I’m not sure you’re exactly what I have in mind for it.” Of course, Uzo [Aduba] is so brilliant, and she is 5,000 times better than I would’ve been in that show. And the show is so brilliant, and I’m watching that and I’m like, I’m such an idiot.

Kitsch: I don’t want to say too much about it, but there’s a director that’s reached out a couple times. I haven’t auditioned in a while, and he’s one of very few that I’m like, I don’t care. I’ll come in and throw my hat in the ring and audition. I’ve auditioned for him and I don’t know, honestly. It’s like he came back and he’s like, “I like you a lot, but the role’s not big enough for you, so I’ll wait down the road for a better role for you.” I’m like, just tell me no instead of “maybe down the road.” But there’s not a lot. I think I’m very picky. But that is something I’ve been hunting for a long time. It would be very intense. It’s this white supremacist true story out of Texas that hasn’t gotten made, obviously, but it’s an incredible script.

What’s a role you’d love to see the other person take on?

Kitsch: Connie’s talking about that detective—a gritty detective. I’d love to see her swing on something that’s fucking dark.

Britton: I keep thinking I need to play a villain.

Kitsch: I would love that.

Britton: I want to see you get back to comedy. You’re really, truly one of the funniest people I know. And you got to be funny on Friday Night Lights. Somebody needs to tap into that with your stuff. You’ve played all these intense characters post–Friday Night Lights, this big leading man bullshit. Be the leading man, but I want to see you be funny.

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