Connie Britton Interview for 'Friday Night Lights'

Connie Britton Q&A

Oct. 1 -- Let's get ready for some football on 'Friday Night Lights.'

The critically acclaimed but low-rated drama returns tonight for a third season, having been saved from cancellation by an unusual deal between NBC and DirecTV. The satellite service will air the season's 13 episodes exclusively this fall, then the network will encore the series in early 2009.

Star Connie Britton, who plays wife, mom and school principal Tami Taylor, chatted with AOL TV about the DirecTV deal, learning to like football and hanging out in Austin with her TV hubby. -- By Kelly Woo

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1. Was it hard not knowing if the show was going to come back for a third season?

It was really hard. We had to stop the show early because of the writers' strike last year. That was the hardest moment, because we didn't even know if we were going to get to finish our season and ever come back. But I don't know there's just something about this show that I've always had faith that it would work out. There's too much great about it. [Laughs] I think I'm, like, a ridiculous idealist or something

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2. How do you think this DirecTV deal will work out?

That's the big mystery. Again, being an optimist, I think it's a really interesting experiment, and so I like to think that people will find it. The constant challenge is just having the audience find the show, and they always have managed to do that. The thing that I'm really curious about is: Are people going to actually subscribe to DirecTV? Are they just going to wait and watch it on NBC? We'll see what happens with that. I'm hopeful that people will find the show and that it will be great for DirecTV, it'll be great for NBC, and everybody.

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3. In the upcoming season, Tami's the new principal. How will that affect her relationship with husband Eric (Kyle Chandler)?

It's really cool, because I think that they wrote it really subtly because instead of having it be just straight-on conflict between Eric and Tami, I actually took on something much bigger -- basically the entire Dillon Panthers football booster association [laughs].

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4. Will the show be more or less focused on football this year?

I think it's going to be really balanced. We always hear complaints on both sides. Even people who aren't big football fans such as myself [laughs] -- the football stuff on our show is so compelling and so beautifully shot you still get pulled in. Last season, I think people felt like they wanted more football. I can tell you we have shot a lot of football scenes. I have been sitting in a lot of stands watching football games [laughs].

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5. A couple actors, Gaius Charles and Scott Porter, are leaving the show. Are they being sent off in a good way?

Oh my gosh -- so good. We're actually in the process right now of shooting Jason Street's storyline, and I have a really strong feeling that one's going to be really amazing. But we shot Smash's storyline, and it really might well be one of the most moving storylines we've had on the show ever. That's what I love about this show and love about these writers -- these characters are leaving because that's the nature of [the show].They are graduating. If they didn't, it wouldn't be realistic. But it's being dealt with in such a great sort of 'Friday Night Lights' very loving way. You really feel like you are continuing into the lives of these characters, even though we're not going to see them all the time.

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6. And if the show continues, you may have to say goodbye to more characters -- perhaps even your TV daughter, Julie (Aimee Teegarden).

I know! It's interesting because I thought about, well, gosh if the show continues -- which I certainly hope it does because I just love it so much -- how will they deal with that? And I talked to [showrunner] Jason Katims about that a little bit. It will probably be the way that I just described the ending storylines for Scott and for Gaius. They will probably be like that for every single one of these characters who would be moving on.

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7. Is Julie still the rebellious daughter this season?

No. They really want to have her growing up a little bit this year, so we're playing a little bit less of that. There's still rebellious stuff that happens, but it happens in a different way, which I was really happy about. It's more about the relationship between mother and daughter when the daughter is growing up and trying to do her own thing and my letting go.

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8. How do you like working with your other TV daughter, who's just a baby?

I love those little babies. You know there are three of them, right? But what's so funny is that when they were first born, they were pretty interchangeable. They were really well-behaved and didn't cry and were really comfortable with the cameras and with me. But now, they're older and the three of them look so different from each other! So there's pretty much only one that we can really use. And they're much more at that age where they're fussy. I feel such a bond with her. It's like somewhere inside her she knows, "Oh, right. You're my TV mom. OK, I'm cool" [laughs].

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9. You and Kyle Chandler have such great chemistry. Do you hang out off the set?

Yeah, we do, actually. We'll always do things in town, go out to dinner, whatever. In fact, this weekend was the big Austin City Limits music festival. I texted him and then he called me, but it was crazy and [there was] music and all this stuff going on, and last night he was finally like, "Just making sure you're still alive!" [laughs] And I thought to myself, well, that's good because we're all here on location and we're all taking care of each other.

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Reader Comments (1)

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John at 2:12PM on Oct 8th 2008

Love Connie Britton. Not fair she and Kyle get snubbed come Emmy time. They and the rest of the cast are truly the best TV actors out there right now. I hope the show continues for a few more seasons as long as they keep doing what they're doing.

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