On an unassuming summer\u2019s day in the early 1960s, Johnny Russell found himself in a position that anyone with a puppy-love crush would dread: having to cancel a date with someone you\u2019re sweet on. A last-minute cancellation could offend the canceled-upon, maybe even so much so that the relationship falters, which makes breaking the news a delicate dance. That day, Russell chose comedy.<\/p>\n
As explained in Ace Collins\u2019 The Stories Behind Country Music\u2019s All-Time Greatest 100 Songs<\/a>, Russell was planning on taking a sweetheart out on a date one summer evening when he received a phone call from some friends in Oklahoma. \u201cThey were doing a recording session in Los Angeles, and they wanted me to come down and help them. There was no getting out of it. So, I had to break a date with a girl I had been seeing. When she asked me why I was going to L.A., I answered, \u2018They are going to put me in the movies and make a big star out of me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe both laughed,\u201d Russell said. But Russell soon realized that his attempt to smooth things over with his date had more potential than a funny excuse. Pretty soon, Russell had a melody to go with the lyrics, \u201cThey\u2019re gonna put me in the movies \/ They\u2019re gonna make a big star out of me \/ We\u2019ll make a film about a man that\u2019s sad and lonely \/ and all I gotta do is act naturally.\u201d There was the hook, song title, and sinker.<\/p>\n How \u201cAct Naturally\u201d Went From a Raincheck to a Real Hit<\/p>\n The same day Johnny Russell told his date that he had to cancel so he could move to Los Angeles and become a big movie star, he wrote the future country standard, \u201cAct Naturally\u201d<\/a>. He had the song in hand before he even made it to the recording session that caused him to bail on his girlfriend in the first place. Although Russell tried to get the artist performing at that session to cut a demo of \u201cAct Naturally\u201d, the songwriter said the musician couldn\u2019t get it under his fingers. So, Russell kept the song for himself, trying\u2014and failing\u2014to pitch it to other artists who might want to cut it.<\/p>\n \u201cI really thought \u2018Act Naturally\u2019 was a fresh approach about talking about being in love,\u201d Russell said in Ace Collins\u2019 book. \u201cI believed that it was unique enough to work, but I couldn\u2019t find anyone else who did. No matter how hard I tried, I just couldn\u2019t get anyone interested in it.\u201d Eventually, the song landed in the hands of Buck Owens, who recorded the first studio version of the song on February 12, 1963. Owens\u2019 \u201cAct Naturally\u201d flew to the No. 1 position on the Billboard Hot Country Singles chart, spending a total of four months on the chart.<\/p>\n The Beatles Used the Country Classic for a Ringo Starr Vehicle<\/p>\n Two years later, The Beatles would record their own version of Buck Owens\u2019 \u201cAct Naturally\u201d with Ringo Starr on lead vocals<\/a>. While a country tune might have seemed out of left field for a group of British rockers, Paul McCartney later said the Fab Four drummer always had an affinity for Americana. \u201cHe always loved country from the first minute I met him,\u201d McCartney told Mojo in 2025. \u201cHe liked the old country singers. George Jones and people like that. He was a big fan of that. So, I think, you know, maybe it suits his personality. He\u2019s a very sincere, straightforward guy, and I think that\u2019s the sort of theme behind a lot of country music.\u201d<\/p>\n The Beatles\u2019 version didn\u2019t perform quite as well in the States, peaking at No. 47 on the Billboard Hot 100. However, in a true full-circle moment, Starr and Owens would later record a duet version of \u201cAct Naturally\u201d in the late 1980s. The track received a 1990 Grammy nomination for Best Country Vocal Collaboration but lost to Hank Williams Sr. and Hank Williams Jr.\u2019s \u201cThere\u2019s a Tear in My Beer\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n Photo by Michael Ochs Archives\/Getty Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On an unassuming summer\u2019s day in the early 1960s, Johnny Russell found himself in a position that anyone…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":472742,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[219239,12013,88,216,13979],"class_list":{"0":"post-472741","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-buck-owens","9":"tag-country-music","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-music","12":"tag-the-beatles"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=472741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472741\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/472742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=472741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=472741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=472741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}