Tucker Pillsbury.
Photo: Erika Goldring/WireImage
Who’s my Role Model? Well, it changes on a whim, but at the moment it’s Alma from Phantom Thread when she snatches some agency in her relationship with Reynolds and delivers the most romantically relatable line in cinema history: “I want you flat on your back, helpless, tender, open, with only me to help.” She’s so real … Wait, sorry, the question was “Who is Role Model?” That has been burning in the minds of both the growing horde that is the Logged-Off community, those whose algorithms never picked up on the artist, and millennials who recognize fewer artists on a festival lineup as the years march ever forward.
Well, the folksy pop singer, real name Tucker Pillsbury, makes his Saturday Night Live debut on October 11 with veteran host Amy Poehler. Below, everything you need to know about the rising musician, from his viral pleas, to a woman named Sally to his Hollywood turn.
A singer-songwriter who went viral early this year with his twangy track “Sally, When the Wine Runs Out” off the deluxe edition of his latest record, Kansas Anymore: The Longest Goodbye. The 2024 LP represents his trendy turn to country, whereas his previous studio effort and debut album, Rx, was more melodic pop.
Role Model’s real name is something that conjures a walking Lacoste ad to the mind, through no fault of his own, of course. Tucker Pillsbury. Middle name Harrison. NBC writes that he embraces both real and professional names. But why did he pick Role Model? “That’s a good question,” he told the Today show on August 29. “You know what, I thought it was funny at the time that I chose it, and you don’t think ahead that if it works out, you’re stuck with that for life. So here we are on live TV as Role Model.”
He spent the past year on tour, first with headlining runs and then supporting Gracie Abrams on her Secret of Us Deluxe Tour. Touring with Abrams is the “loafer crowd” version of Charli XCX and Troye Sivan’s brat-green bacchanal. “I didn’t realize just how much crossover there was in our music until we were on tour together,” he told L’Officiel on February 21. “It was very cool. It really does feel like our little wholesome ‘Sweat Tour.’” The Lacoste image holds up.
As far as personal life, he dated fellow influencer Emma Chamberlain from 2020 to 2023.
The protagonist of his dating plea, “Sally, When the Wine Runs Out.” In the song, he hopes that date-slash-hookup will like him sober as much as she likes him drunk. Role Model traditionally brings a famous person or a fan onstage when he performs it live. He’s managed to get Olivia Rodridgo, Bowen Yang, Renée Rapp, Hilary Duff, Kate Hudson, and even Natalie Portman to play Sally in the ritual.
If you’re wondering why and how he’s cutting it up onstage with Natalie Portman of all A-listers, then buddy, we’ve got the answer for you. Role Model will join Portman and Mark Ruffalo for Lena Dunham’s upcoming rom-com, Good Sex. Model plays a Brooklyn hipster in his 20s alongside romantic interest Portman, who is a recently divorced couples therapist also dating a middle-age New Yorker (Ruffalo). The woman at the center of the love triangle? She goes by Sally without the S.
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