Nashville's Day in Court

Bill Myers and his unseen handiwork.

One of the busiest days on set for Nashville episode 209 was Lamar's appearance in court for a bail hearing, with Rayna looking on. We were downtown in a working courthouse (Nashville loves the show and bends over to accommodate us). There were tons of extras, awkward filming angles, a lot of important moments (it was one of the show's act outs).

One indicator of how chaotic things got: halfway through filming the scene, it was discovered that one of the flags behind the judge's head clearly said "STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE." Turns out someone in the art department had thought we needed a dark blue flag to replicate a federal court, but hadn't actually read the flag, or expected it to be more tightly furled. We ended up having to cut around it.

But one of the most labored over items in the court also does not appear  in the episode, so I wanted to pay tribute to it here. As I was surveying the scene, I saw that one of the extras was doing a courtroom artist sketch of Lamar and Rayna. It stopped me in my tracks -- it was really good. My reporter's instincts took hold and I asked the man about himself. And I was amply rewarded for my curiosity.