When Kate Hudson Realized She ‘Hadn’t Put Everything Out on the Table,’ It Changed Her Career Forever

By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy . We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. The oft-cited story of how Kate Hudson came to play Claire Sardina in “Song Sung Blue” is a good one . As it goes , her eventual co-star Hugh Jackman saw Hudson performing and chatting on “CBS Sunday Morning” in 2024 , where the actress and Oscar nominee was promoting her soon-to-be-released solo album, “Glorious.” Jackman, who was already on board to star as Mike Sardina in Craig Brewer’s fact-based film , was so taken by Hudson’s energy (and singing!) that he immediately texted Brewer that he had found their Claire. The real story of how Hudson found her way to the role is a bit more complicated. It’s not just about the film itself (a crowdpleaser with real drama, plus a ton of Neil Diamond songs ), but Hudson’s own path through Hollywood, her long-burning desire to mount a singing career in tandem with her acting, and a years-ago decision to start pursuing the stuff she had long felt was unavailable to her. Speaking to IndieWire via Zoom during the busy days between the Critics Choice Awards and the Golden Globes, Hudson is just what you’d expect: warm, chatty, effusive, insightful, and smart. She’s easy to talk to, open to all sorts of questions, and reflective in a way that never feels harsh. And she is reflective. While the role of Claire (aka “Thunder” in the Sardinas’ Neil Diamond cover act, “Thunder and Lightning”) found its way to her, Hudson said she was “always” hopeful for acting parts that could include singing. The big barrier? Herself. “One of my fears was like, ‘Oh, I’m going to make a record, and I’m going to put some music out, and then it’s like, therefore , I’m not acting anymore,'” she said. “Back in the ‘Almost Famous’ days, you didn’t cross [into another type of entertainment] because it was like, if you failed, it was a failure in everything. So don’t break what’s not broken. It made me timid to put anything out there like that. ... After COVID, I was like, I’m really waiting for someone else to get permission to do a movie that is a big musical, and then I could come in from the back door and do my album, because then it would be a little bit easier to sort of cross.” The early days of the pandemic gave Hudson, like many people, lots of time to think about her life and what she wanted from it, what she hadn’t done yet, and how she might change things around when the world opened back up. “Even bigger than just music, it was like I just had this whole existential crisis, which I think most of the world did, where you’re...

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