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Quick and Dirty With... Billy Ray Cyrus

Host, Nashville Star (NBC)

JASON GAY

Posted Jul 16, 2008 8:53 AM

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So is Miley still grounded?

[Laughs] In which way? There's two definitions of grounded. One is that your head's on straight. And the other is that you're in trouble.

I mean the second one.

No, she's not grounded. She never ceases to amaze me. She's made a great album. People are gonna look at Miley Cyrus and go, "Wow, I didn't know she could do that."

Going back a few months to that hurricane over the Vanity Fair photo — how did you get through it?

I had to just kind of stand back there and weather the storm. I kept telling Miley, "Focus on your music." We both know the truth. I don't think Annie Leibovitz intentionally did anything. It was just one of those things that snowballed.

On Nashville Star, you're not mean like they are on Idol.

I could never hurt anybody's feelings. I'm the last person to point a finger at somebody. We had to let a guy go last week, and it just tore me up.

When you were making the switch from music to acting, wasn't David Lynch one of your earliest advocates?

David was the guy, plain and simple. I went out to L.A., and I was just looking through a newspaper, and it said that David was casting for Mulholland Drive. I was a fan of his, and I thought, "Man, if I could just get in that movie." There was an audition for Gene the pool man, and when [Lynch] hires me, he says, "Cyrus, you could be an actor if you want to be." I know this sounds crazy, but there might not be a Hannah Montana if it wasn't for David Lynch.

[From Issue 1056-1056 — July 10, 2008]