Tammy Wynette, played by Jessica Chastain in the six-episode limited series George & Tammy, was a country icon born May 5, 1942, in Mississippi.
Early in life, Wynette, born Virginia Wynette Pugh, worked picking cotton and later enrolled in beauty school. It wasn't until 1965 that the young mother of three began making trips to Nashville in an attempt to pursue a career in music and get a record deal, according to her website.
Her stage name was changed to Tammy after she auditioned for and was signed by Epic Records producer Billy Sherrill, played by David Wilson Barnes in the show.
She married her third husband, country musician George Jones, whom she had idolized as a teen, in 1969. The two had a rocky six-year marriage, and a musical partnership that yielded a string of hit duets.
The new show is adapted from the memoir of their only daughter, Georgette Jones Lennon, The Three of Us: Growing Up with Tammy and George. Chastain has been connected to the project since 2011, per The Hollywood Reporter, and served as a producer on the series.
"I'm very protective of them and I can't imagine anyone else playing her, and I couldn't imagine anyone else playing George, which was why I called Mike," Chastain told the outlet of the couple, and how she recruited Michael Shannon to play opposite her as Jones. "I know how protective Mike is of the characters he plays so it just felt like the right recipe for a working environment."
