Sweet Home Alabama – Exclusive Interview With Tribble Reese

Features, Interviews

Tribble Reese and the women of Sweet Home Alabama

Oh friends, sometimes being a blogger is so much fun. I recently had the pleasure of chatting with Tribble Reese, who you all know as the handsome star of CMT’s Sweet Home Alabama. I’m obsessed with the show and have been reviewing it all season, so I was really excited (and kinda nervous because, you know, I’m a dork) to get to ask him a few questions about the show. As I’m sure you can imagine, he was super charming and gave me lots of great insight about the show.

Tribble talked to me while en route to the Country Music Awards in Nashville. Who was he excited to see? “Everybody,” he told me. “This is like the Superbowl of country music.” (Personally, I’d be stalking Carrie Underwood for an autograph.)

My first question for Tribble was about the country vs. city concept that Sweet Home Alabama is based on – he had to have a preference before even starting the show, right? Not so. “Being a country guy, I didn’t want to go in with a closed mind,” Tribble said. “I judged each individual girl by her character. I’ve been raised with country values, but I went in with an open mind and was ready to see what’s out there.”

But even with that wide open mind, Tribble couldn’t have been ready for someone like Kristina with a K. So what was his reaction to meeting Miss OC-licious?

The way to this guy’s heart is with a shotgun…for hunting! Jeez!

“OC-licious, she’s definitely not my typical — I’d say she’s atypical from the girls I’d usually date. She’s so outlandish and sparkly.” But, Tribble said, the sparkly diva’s got a great personality. “She’s so funny, she’s so confident. The way she carries herself and exudes her personality, there’s something attractive about that.”

From one extreme to another, after I asked Tribble about the ultimate city girl I had to ask him about the country girls. Specifically, the ones who brought deer antlers into the kitchen. Gross, or cool? According to Tribble, it’s cool.

“I was 100% impressed. I grew up hunting and usually the men go out, so for them to get up that early and do that, literally kill a deer for me, it was a nice unspoken thing to do.” (So take note, ladies – you want to woo a Southern gentleman? Then you better BYO-Dinner.)

One thing I knew I had to ask Tribble about was his date with Tiffany during last week’s episode. It seemed like they had a great date, but then she asked Tribble to let her go at the next elimination. What was up with that?

“She had a little boy back home,” Tribble told me. Tribble respected her decision. “I was surprised, but I didn’t want to show my disappointment too much because I knew she was disappointed too.”

Of all the dates we’ve seen so far, one stands out to Tribble as the coolest – his date with Cassie. “I’ve never been in a bi-plane, and it was made in 1928, it was ancient,” Tribble said. “That’s my ideal date, doing something that’s fun that we’ve both never done before. It was great to get to know her that way.”

In Friday night’s upcoming episode Tribble will take the twelve remaining girls to his alma mater, Clemson University. Tribble says it was “one of my favorite parts of the whole experience.” But with twelve women still sharing the house and fighting for Tribble’s attention, the drama also starts to heat up. “I didn’t get to know anything going on in the house. I heard mumblings of some drama going on, but I didn’t really see any of it for myself.”

“Around me the girls want to put their best foot forward and are really minding their p’s and q’s.”

But, did he know how much the girls hated Ashley Ann? No, but Tribble did hear the groans from the other girls after he kept her safe last week. “At this point no, I still didn’t know the extent of the dislike for Ashley Ann. Even the country girls don’t like her and the city girls think she’s fake. She’s kind of on her own in this.” That said, seeing what went on with the girls in the house didn’t changed Tribble’s opinions of anyone.

And what about the girls he let go? One of the more controversial girls cast on the show this season was Hailey Glassman, who was involved in the Jon Gosselin tabloid scandal a couple years ago. And unfortunately for her, that played a part in why Tribble had to let her go.

“It’s a lot to handle,” Tribble said of learning about Hailey’s past. “It’s a lot to take in and it’s an unorthodox situation. I’m not looking for flaws, but I want to find that perfect girl for me. That was tabloid news for like, six months. It played a bigger role than it might have in my regular dating life because I don’t have time to get to know everything behind it and I have to be safe. But Hailey is a great girl.”

Not only did Tribble send home Hailey last week, but he sent home Torie and Michelle – and as I pointed out in my review of the episode, they were both education majors. Weird coincidence or teacher-related childhood trauma? “Just a funny coincidence,” said Tribble. “My mom is a teacher, so I know it’s a tough job to do.” Unfortunately, Tribble just didn’t feel the spark with the wannabe-educators. “If you don’t feel that connection early on you kind of have to cut it off at the chase.”

“As we move further along in the season, it gets tougher and tougher since I’m sending girls home who I do have a connection with.”

As the decisions get more difficult for him, so do things for the girls. “The girls get more jealous as the feelings grow and they see other people getting dates. I know exactly how they feel.” But, it sounds like it was all worth it: “I’m very happy with the girl I picked, and we’re seeing where things go.”

You guys better start tuning in, because according to Tribble the drama and the romance are heating up and “it only gets better”.


You can follow Jill at her blog, couchtimewithjill.com, or on Twitter @jillemader Jill has been an avid fan of TV since the age of two, when she was so obsessed with Zoobilee Zoo that her mother lied and told her it had been canceled. Despite that setback, she grew up to be a television aficionado and pop culture addict.