Last Wednesday's episode of "Nashville" included a plot twist that left fans reeling as music manager Jeff Fordham (Oliver Hudson) was killed when he fell down the side of a building.
Prior to the episode's airing, several promos teased that fans were in for a shocking hour as the promo clips featured Juliette (Hayden Panettiere) standing on the roof of a building as she contemplates suicide. Juliette is suffering from postpartum depression and has become addicted to alcohol after the birth of her baby, and when Jeff went up to talk her out of it, he was the one who ended up falling to his death.
Speaking to Deadline, executive producer and showrunner Dee Johnson talked about the decision to kill off Hudson's character and about the repercussions of his death.
"We wanted this character who was widely viewed as a villain, to go out in an unexpectedly heroic way," said Johnson.
"We wanted him to seemingly have it all, to have grown enough as a human being to care about a desperately lost Juliette, even though he was no longer her manager."
Meanwhile, Hudson told The Hollywood Reporter that he "loved" how his character left the show because Jeff has been the bad guy for quite some time.
"In the last season and the beginning of this season, we get to see a little bit of his heart and we get to see him let go a bit and fall in love a little bit and soften up a little bit only to have him fly off the top of a building," the actor tells the website.
According to Deadline, Hudson started as a recurring character on "Nashville" before being promoted as a regular. This season, he was returned to recurring status as he signed on for "Scream Queens."
Hudson told THR that when he started to do the Fox show and realized that he only had four episodes that he was allowed to do on "Nashville," he was "praying for this sort of demise" for his character. He revealed that Johnson seemed to have picked up on what he wanted and called him while he was in Colorado to explain how his character would exit the show.
Johnson told Deadline that Jeff's death will have "big ramifications" professionally and personally for Layla, Luke and Juliette. And for Juliette, Jeff's demise will be "the worst sort of wake-up call" which could possibly help her realize the things that truly matter in life.
"Nashville" season 4 airs Wednesdays at 10 p.m. on ABC.
