fbpx

Country Music Icon Inspired This SWEET MAGNOLIAS Actress: ‘Best Years’

Photo from Reba McEntire’s Instagram

Country Music Icon Inspired This SWEET MAGNOLIAS Actress: ‘Best Years’

By Movieguide® Contributor

SWEET MAGNOLIAS star JoAnna Garcia Swisher says this actress inspired her the most in her acting career.

Swisher played Reba McEntire’s daughter in the hit show REBA from 2001 to 2007.

“This was some of the best years of my life,” she told SheKnows. “My first impression of Reba was I couldn’t believe that I’m standing in the same room as Reba McEntire.”

“Just being around her has taught me so much, that you can be a boss and a really successful woman,” she added. “I’m still learning from her and she’s still the queen. She’s just always bringing it.”

The REBA cast is still close. Last year, they got together to celebrate a special birthday for Christopher Rich.

“On last nights episode of ‘Brock’s Angel’s’ old friends got together to hang out, laugh, catch up and celebrate a milestone Birthday,” Melissa Peterman, who played Barbra Jean Booker Hart, wrote on social media. “Who ate all the pizza? Where’s the leftover cake? Why torture that innocent song? Case Closed. #foreverfamily.”

McEntire isn’t the only one who inspired Swisher. She played Bree in GOSSIP GIRL in 2009, and there she met one of the most important people in her life.

“So when I first got asked to do GOSSIP GIRL, I thought ‘Who doesn’t want to go spend the summer in New York City making out with Chace Crawford?’” Swisher explained. “But plot twist, I ended up making out, well I did make out with Chase Crawford onscreen, but I made out with my husband because this is where I met Nick [Swisher].”

“I met Nick probably a couple of days into coming to New York City to film GOSSIP GIRL,” she said. The two have been together ever since and were married in 2010.

“One of the things that really struck me about Nick when I met him was his desire to start a family. Becoming a father was so important to him, so I knew right then and there that we were both aligned and wanted to experience parenthood together,” she said of Nick.

Movieguide® previously reported on Swisher’s relationship with her husband:

JoAnna Garcia Swisher is thankful for the father her husband is to their daughters.

The SWEET MAGNOLIAS actress shared her appreciation for her husband, Nick Swisher, in light of the recent loss of her own dad.

“It’s really sweet. That is something that I could get really emotional about,” she told PEOPLE. “I was very, very, very close to my dad. He was the ultimate girl dad, so I know how important that role is in a young girl’s life.”

The actress lost her father in 2019, which gave her a deeper gratitude for the kind of father her husband is.

“I feel so grateful that I’m doing this with him and I feel grateful for my daughters,” she said.