'Nashville': 'Changing Ground'

Rayna and Deacon were getting hot and heavy between the sheets - finally! Ah, but it was just a dream. Teddy woke Rayna up and brought her back to reality. Downstairs, Rayna's sister Tandy told her Teddy's poll numbers were in the toilet, so Rayna offered to perform at his next fundraiser. Teddy was thrilled when he heard the news, but less thrilled when Rayna called him out on his slump. He said internal polling was bunk. She understood, but didn't want to be left in the dark.

When the cops showed up at Juliette's, she assumed they wanted her mother. But they wanted her, because they'd seen the video of her shoplifting. Everyone had seen it. Even Katie Couric was talking about it. Juliette laughed at the cops and shut the door in their faces. While her mother tittered in the background, Glenn worked on spin control and called Juliette's publicist McKenna back to town. Juliette was desperate to get out of the house and away from her mom. Too bad her gate was blocked by reporters.

The next morning, McKenna showed up with a press release ready to go and a "GMA" appearance lined up. Juliette said no to both. She wanted to focus on her yoga and get her head ready for her tour, but McKenna said she owed her fans an explanation and warned "the fallout could be huge." She was right. The CMA's dropped Juliette from the presenter list and she was the focus of the lead sketch on "SNL." Glenn warned that it takes work to last as long in this biz as Rayna has. "This is a make or break moment," McKenna added, so Juliette agreed to do "GMA."

Later, she watched the twittersphere skewer her, comparing her to Britney Spears and LiLo and trashing her for being a bad role model. She took it out on her mom, who'd made her pink macaroni, with ketchup and cream cheese in it - just the way she liked it. Juliette sneered that Jolene was just pretending to be a good mother so she could pocket some of Juliette's stuff and buy drugs. Then she poured out her mom's backpack, but all she found was a photo of her mom holding her when she was a newborn. Juliette fell apart.

 
She didn’t seem to be doing much better during her "GMA" prep meeting with McKenna, who told her Robin Roberts would be fair but thorough. When she said Roberts would bring up folks like Lindsay and Winona, Juliette got defensive. "It was a freaking bottle of nail polish!" she snarked. McKenna told her she couldn't get defensive during the interview. She had a brand to uphold and a white trash history she'd spent years hiding. "Stay on message," she said. Juliette agreed to be honest and smiled.
But she was not honest. "Everybody wants to young and famous and rich, and I am and people are very jealous," she told Roberts via satellite, going on to explain that she'd planned to pay for the polish but lost focus because life at the top is so distracting, what with the paparazzi and all those people trying to make you fail. It went from bad to worse when Roberts brought up her mom's recent drug arrest. Juliette ended the interview and walked off camera. Her team went into overdrive, but they were spinning their wheels. Her opening act and her sponsors were bailing, which meant the tour was off.

Upstarts Scarlett and Gunnar were having better luck. They landed that publishing deal, thanks to the demo they made with Whatty. Gunnar opened his arms to celebrate with a hug, but Scarlett ran to Avery, who couldn't have looked less excited.




Later, they got a tour of their new publishing house. Scarlett was overwhelmed. Gunnar made friends Hailey, who was happy to hear Scarlett had a plus one for dinner and Gunnar didn't. Over dinner, Austin native Gunnar revealed he'd been hustling for his big break and working at The Blue Bird for almost three years. Scarlett, of course, had just followed Avery's dreams to Nashville. She'd been writing her whole life, because her mama showed her the poetry of song lyrics when she was a kid. They assumed her Uncle Deacon's genes must have helped, but Scarlett said she'd learned everything from Avery. Then she embarrassed him by raving about him and his band. He was still pouting about it after dinner. He railed on her for talking him up, scoffed at all her "writing process" babble, handed her the keys and walked home. "Just let me go," he grumbled.

  

Gunnar's night ended better: He woke up in bed with Hailey the next morning. She hoped it wouldn't be awkward at work and said she was fine if it was a one-time thing. He teased her for being like a dude. After a few more kisses, she hopped out of bed. They walked out together and Scarlett spotted them, but ducked down in her the car. 

Then Scarlett went to talk to Deacon about the tension caused by her stumbling into success while Avery was still struggling. "Avery's either going to keep up or he's going to be left behind, and that’s that," said Deacon, who'd spent a good share of his life trying to keep up with Rayna.

Back at home, Scarlet called out Avery and asked his support. "I'm trying," he said, before walking out of the room. Over at their new publishing house, Gunnar continued to woo Hailey.

Meanwhile, Rayna's manager called Deacon about Teddy's campaign performance. He said he was supporting Coleman - In fact, he was having coffee with Coleman, who was his sober sponsor. But he agreed to play with Rayna, anyway. Rayna was surprised. She'd assumed he'd want to stay away from the club and her daddy. "If he can deal with it; I can deal with it," she said.

At the host committee meeting for the fundraiser, Rayna had a very uncomfortable exchange with Peggy, a woman who walked in and then tried to sneak out unnoticed, but failed. Teddy, on the other hand, looked happy to see Peggy and thanked her for setting up the event. Rayna gave Teddy crap later, saying Peggy still had the hots for him, but her real issue was being back in Daddy's club. She imagined any one of those committee women would make a better politician's wife than her. He laughed that off, saying he'd married her because she "dazzled" him.  

Rayna was so nervous about performing at the country club that she needed to hold a cigarette before he set. "These are the people who made fun of me in high school for liking country music," she told Bucky. He pointed out she'd gotten the last laugh, but things only got worse when the space filled up. Lamar gave Deacon crap for being underdressed and soon, Deacon was facing off with Teddy, but it didn't come to blows. After all the tension, Lamar smiled and kicked off the event with a short speech thanking all the familiar faces for supporting Teddy, "one of our own." When Rayna came on stage, she even managed to give her Daddy a kiss.

As she sang "Changing Ground," there were a lot of meaningful looks between Deacon and Teddy and between Teddy and Peggy, who wanted Teddy to sneak out. Teddy shook his head no, but left right after the song. Rayna noticed. Or at least, she noticed the Deacon part. After the set, she accused Deacon of "taking the bait" and accused him of being destructive.

"I can't believe you put us in this position," she marveled.

"Which us?" he asked.  

She teared up when she admitted she needed him, but neither of them knew what to do with that, anymore. "We're done," Rayna said, which is just what we heard last week from him. At home, Teddy said he couldn't deal with it and Rayna told him she was firing Deacon.

The next morning, Teddy met Peggy in a vacant lot. She was sure someone would find out about them and suggested they come clean. He told her his campaign, his career and his marriage depended on her silence. Was their secret an affair? Or something to do with his shady business deal? 

Over at Juliette's, Glenn tried bail on the spiraling starlet too, because she wasn't following his advise. She cried and begged him to help her get back her image and her tour. "I will do whatever it takes," she promised, so he asked why she shoplifted. She said it was something she used to do as a kid. "It made me feel like I could take care of myself when no one else would." With that, he was back in and said they'd regroup in the morning. He suggested she hang out with a friend in the meantime, but she didn't have any. "I just have people who want to be seen with me… Well, used to."

With her mom's macaroni half eaten in front of her, Juliette picked up the phone and called Deacon. After all that went down with Rayna, he was very receptive.