(upbeat music)
- Broadway alum Katharine McPhee is a brand new mom,
and she's got a brand new TV show.
Paul's here with more.
- Hi, Tamsen.
2021 is off to an amazing start for Katharine.
She and her husband, David Foster,
just welcomed their new son in late February.
And now you can see her starring
and singing in her new Netflix sitcom "Country Comfort."
♪ I been here before ♪
♪ I'm no stranger to this town ♪
- Bailey, we still haven't made it. Something has to change.
- Okay. What direction?
- You're out.
(audience laughs)
She's in.
- [Paul] Katharine plays an aspiring country singer
named Bailey, who takes a job as a nanny
for a handsome cowboy and his five children.
We talked about parenting, "Country Comfort" and more.
Comfort shows are very important to us right now, right?
- It's true. - I mean, just the fact
that it has the word comfort in it.
So much of Netflix has been comfort for us.
- I know it's so true.
It's such a relaxing show to watch, honestly, you know,
when I have to watch myself, like they send me something
you know, watch the episode
so you know what you're talking about.
I thought, "Oh God, here I go.
I'm gonna have to watch this.
And like, it's hard for me to watch myself
and I didn't have anybody around and I put it on,
like on a Friday night, and I watched six episodes in a row.
And I honestly, I enjoyed it.
I genuinely really liked the show.
And I mean, I love doing the show,
but I really liked the show,
and it was easy for me to watch.
So I thought, okay, this is a good sign.
If I can stomach it, 'cause I'm gonna be
the toughest critic on myself for sure,
then this could be a good sign for people
finding this show and hopefully liking it.
It's a really sweet concept for show.
- So is this something you filmed before the pandemic?
- Yeah, so we shot, I think I started
in February, the end of January.
It's a sitcom, so we did in front of a live audience,
which is really great every Friday night,
the energy that the visitors backstage,
and it was just really, really fun.
And then we got shut down after four episodes,
and we shut down for about six months.
I came back.
I was five months pregnant,
maybe yeah, five months pregnant.
And so my costumes changed quite a bit, you know,
so suddenly wearing things a little more drapy
and my body was quite fit the first four episodes.
I was showing off my arms and midriff and things like that.
She wasn't quite as sexy when she returned for episode five.
It's great being a new mom.
Oh gosh, he's the sweetest.
And I know every mom probably says that,
but I love being a mom.
I love it.
I mean, I knew I would love it and I just didn't know
I would get so lucky to have
such a sweet, good sleeping baby.
He's doing pretty well.
He's eating really well and sleeping really well.
So you're tired, but it's the best kind of tired
'cause it's just so rewarding
and you just trying to soak up every moment
'cause it does go by quickly.
He's already started getting so big.
He's three weeks old and he's so much bigger
than he was when he first came into my arms.
(upbeat music)
♪ Make it work ♪
♪ Make it easy ♪
♪ Make it clever ♪
♪ Craft it into pieces ♪
- And I'm sure that a lot of the performance
of "Waitress" kinda got you ready for a sitcom too.
A lot of the scenes in "Waitress" were very comedy-based.
- There was a lot of comedy based in "Waitress,"
and just any time I think you have experience
in front of a live audience, knowing when to hold for laughs
or applause or whatever is great for sitcom.
They're very similar art forms for sure.
- [Paul] How do you look back
on that whole sort of experience
of doing Jenna in "Waitress?"
- I look back on it so fondly,
and it's been really wild for me
to think about that last performance,
which was January 5th, I think, where we closed "Waitress,"
and it was such a incredible experience
to be a part of the show, open the show in London,
be able to close it.
And then within weeks, like six weeks later,
I could probably stand corrected,
but the whole community was shut down,
as sad as it was to have Broadway shut down,
you just kinda go, "Whoa, I was so lucky.
"I was so, so lucky to really be one
"of the last few people to experience that
'cause we had no idea that the community
"was gonna be shut down for so long."
(upbeat music)