This is her new life.
Chrissy Metz, best known for playing Kate Pearson on the NBC drama “This Is Us,” recently ditched Hollywood after 21 years.
“I moved to Nashville,” the actress, 44, revealed to People in an interview published Friday.
“I was in LA for 21 years, but my family is in Florida, where I’m from, and during the pandemic, I could drive to them from here. It’s just a better quality of life here,” Metz explained. “Everything is 15 minutes away, and it’s just so much less stress.”
“There’s a lot going on,” she continued. “There’s obviously great music, great food. I grew up in the South, so I’m used to sort of that hospitality — it feels more communal here. In LA it was always like, ‘Oh, you have an audition? What’s it for? Oh, you have an audition? What for?’ It was all very dog eat dog!”
Metz has been keeping busy since starring on the hit drama “This Is Us” for six seasons from 2016 to 2022. When not acting, she also has dabbled in music. In July 2021, she even performed at Nashville’s famed Bluebird Cafe. Her debut country album, “Prayed for This Day,” was released in 2023.
Even more, the “American Horror Story” alum recently wrote a new children’s book, “When I Talk to God, I Talk About Feelings.” It hits bookstores on April 8.
The new story is a follow-up to Metz’s 2023 book, “When I Talk to God, I Talk About You.“
“I taught preschool for five years, and ultimately kids always want to talk about their feelings,” the Golden Globe nominee told the outlet of her inspiration. “They want to feel seen and heard.”
“I think we’re coming into this age of mental health awareness and just talking about our feelings in real ways,” Metz explained. “And so I wondered, could we preemptively strike and get the kids to name their feelings and then express their feelings and have the confidence to even do that?”
Despite leaving Hollywood, the star would love to reunite with her “This Is Us” cast. The ensemble also included her TV parents Mandy Moore and Milo Ventimiglia, on-screen siblings Sterling K. Brown and Justin Hartley and love interest Chris Sullivan.
“I would [be down],” Metz told Entertainment Tonight in 2023. “I’m like, where would it be set?”
“I mean, anything’s possible,” she went on. “I think everybody wants to see it. Every single time I see someone they’re like, ‘We wish the show was still on.’ I’m like, ‘Me too.’ You know, job security. But I do love the show and everybody involved.”
“I think, like, in 10 years and we’re all, like, 50-ish, I think that will be cute, a little reunion,” she said. “Fingers crossed. It takes a while to make art, y’all! One can only dream!”
Metz is pushing for the Pearson’s reunion to take place in Nashville.
“There’s so much talent,” she gushed about the city. “In the airport, literally every single person is talented, whether they’re playing an instrument or they’re singing their face off at [Blake Shelton’s] Ole Red. Everybody’s talented here. And everybody’s a songwriter. It’s everywhere. It’s all the time. It’s so exciting. You’re around it all the time. And I feel like it’s a very communal city, which is nice. People like working together.”
In the meantime, fans of the Dan Fogelman-created series can tune into the “This Was Us” rewatch podcast hosted by Moore, 40, Brown, 48, and Sullivan, 44.
These days, Ventimiglia, 47, is headed to Netflix to star opposite Sam Worthington in the limited series “I Will Find You.”
The drama is based on Harlan Coben’s novel of the same name and will also feature Britt Lower, Erin Richards and Logan Browning. The news comes on the heels of Ventimiglia’s house burning down in the Palisades Fires.
“You start thinking about all the memories and the different parts of the house and whatnot and then you see your neighbors’ houses and everything around and your heart just breaks,” he told CBS Evening News at the time.
Moore was also personally affected as she lost her home in the Easton Fire. She and her husband, Dawes frontman Taylor Goldsmith, temporarily moved in with Hilary Duff and her husband, Matthew Koma, in the aftermath.
Hartley, for his part, now stars on CBS’ “Tracker” while Brown leads the Hulu sci-fi series “Paradise,” which was just renewed for Season 2.