“Good music is going to find good people. I believe that in my heart and soul.” CMT has released the first teaser for Sun Records, its new scripted series based on the Tony-winning musical Million Dollar Quartet.
In the clip we get the first look at young Elvis Presley, played by Drake Milligan, along with Johnny Cash (Kevin Fonteyne) with guitars, Jerry Lee Lewis (Christian Lees) on the keys, and Sun Records founder Sam Phillips (Chad Michael Murray) in the studio asking to hear something musically he hasn’t heard before.
Set in Memphis during the tumultuous early days of the civil rights movement, Sun Records tells the untold story of nothing less than the birth of rock ‘n’ roll. Guided by Sam Phillips, young musicians like Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis combined the styles of hillbilly country with the 1950s R&B sound created by artists like Muddy Waters, B.B. King, Fats Domino and Ike Turner, and changed the course of music forever. The series chronicles the young artists’ often jarring and sudden meteoric rise to fame in the face of sweeping political change and social unrest.
Cast also includes Billy Gardell (Presley and Eddy Arnold’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker), Jonah Lees (Jimmy Swaggart), Trevor Donovan (Eddy Arnold), Keir O’Donnell (Dewey Phillips), Jennifer Holland (Sam’s wife Becky Phillips), Margaret Anne Florence (Sam’s assistant Marion Keisker), and Kerry Holliday (Ike Turner).
Sun Records is produced by Thinkfactory Media with Leslie Greif as executive producer, Gil Grant as executive producer and showrunner, Barry Berg as co-executive producer and Herb Nanas and Colin Escott as producers. Roland Joffé directs, with Jayson Dinsmore and Julia Silverton as executive producers for CMT.
Sun Records premieres February 23 on CMT. The series will be paired with Nashville’s part of the network’s Thursday night programming lineup. – by Denise Petski, December 19, 2016 9:00am
