How Hunter McVey Went From OnlyFans Modeling to Starring in ‘9-1-1: Nashville’

Everyone loves a “star is born” story, à la Mervyn LeRoy stumbling upon Lana Turner at Schwab’s Pharmacy (which was only partly true — it was Hollywood Reporter founder William Wilkerson who discovered her at Top Hat Café).

But Hollywood has changed a good bit since 1936, and so has the nature of its overnight success stories. Just ask 26-year-old Hunter McVey, a fitness model and influencer who suspects his OnlyFans account may have contributed to his own, instant transformation into a primetime TV star.

“Who knows?” McVey tells THR in addressing his dalliance with OnlyFans, which lasted less than one year. “It could have been part of the reason I’m here today.”

Clearly someone out there liked what they saw, as McVey — who had never acted before, much less stepped foot on a Hollywood soundstage — was assigned an acting coach by 20th Television and flown to L.A. from his hometown of Nashville to audition for a key recurring role on 9-1-1: Nashville: that of stripped-turned-firefighter Blue Bennings.

Before his return flight had even landed, his phone pinged him that he had gotten the part. Realizing he was meant for bigger things, McVey shut down the OnlyFans account, telling his following in a farewell video message, “I appreciate your support over this journey. I cannot thank you enough. And I’m not just saying that because it allowed me to change my life and change my family’s life.”

We caught up with McVey over Zoom to find out more about how he defied the odds to become Hollywood’s next big thing.

Let’s start at the very beginning, Hunter. Where are you from?

I was born in Franklin, Tennessee. I don’t have too many memories in Franklin, as I spent most of my early childhood in southern Indiana outside of Evansville. My backyard was a cornfield. I moved to Northern Virginia for the later part of my childhood and went to school at Virginia Tech. When I went to school in 2017, my parents made a full-circle move back to Franklin, so I spent summers and winters in Franklin until 2021. When I graduated, I moved to downtown Nashville.

And what brought you to Nashville?

I wanted to be close to family, and I was working a sales job at a financial firm in college at the time, and they had an office outside of Nashville.

How did you get into modeling?

I probably did four or five different jobs before modeling. I sold insurance in 28 states. I did marketing for a CBD company. I worked at a hospital and sold full-body CT scans. I started posting on social media while I was working that job at the hospital. I made a goal for myself to post every single day for a year and thought that would allow me to become self-employed. In about seven to eight months, I was making enough income to quit that job at the hospital.

What were you posting that you were making the income?

All sorts of videos. First it was fitness, nutrition videos. Then it turned into personal care, lifestyle, clothing, skincare, haircare, mindset videos. Then I got contacted by modeling agencies and started modeling. I started a clothing brand. I started a podcast. I started multiple businesses, some I got to launching, some failed. Then we got to acting in May of 2025.

I have seen articles online that say you were on OnlyFans. Is that correct?

Yes. It was a great stepping stone for me and it definitely served its purpose. When I started modeling, I figured most of my audience — and that was hundreds of thousands of people, actually — came in just because of the way I looked. So when I was posting value-driven content about health and fitness, I would notice the views weren’t doing as well because most people are there just to see my modeling photos, see me shirtless.

And I found a platform [in OnlyFans] where I could post all of my modeling photos, all of the behind the scenes footage and a space for my fans to get better connected with me. I would get 40 or 50 DMs about it every single day about people asking me to make one. So I said, “You know what? If I can make the same or more amount of money with modeling from home and I get to have my time and not have to travel, why not?” I met some great people on there. The fans were great, and it was a stepping stone in terms of my career.

Who knows? It could have been part of the reason I’m here today. The last two years of my history has been trial and error. I’m not scared to fail, and it’s just something that was a part of my journey getting here.

How long were you on it?

All told, maybe seven or eight months.

Did you ever do full nudity on OnlyFans?

No.

OK. But there were tiers that people could pay to subscribe to you?

Yeah, I did multiple different tiers. I think I had a free page, I think I had a $10 page at some points. It just switched. There were different ways for marketing purposes to charge people.

So then let’s get to acting. You had never acted before?

Correct.

Had you ever aspired to acting before?

Not really. It was very out of the blue.

So tell me about it, because you did very well, very quickly.

I kind of got thrown into the fire, but that’s one of the best ways to learn in life. I think the opportunity itself came up because I had submitted an audition tape for a role in a JFK Jr. series that Ryan Murphy and FX were working on. I saw it come across my inbox from one of my modeling agencies. I had never submitted for an acting audition before, but something about it sparked my interest and I told my fiancée that it may be a good idea to submit for it. I thought it may get me in front of some of the correct people, even though I didn’t know how to do it.

I filmed it and it was a terrible audition tape. I did multiple things wrong. I was looking the wrong way. I was reading it wrong.

I assume you were auditioning to play JFK Jr.?

Correct. And so I submitted that. I didn’t hear anything back then. About a month later, my modeling agent was like, “Hey, there’s a show that’s filming in Nashville soon. They’d like to do a reading with you. Would you like to hop on?” And I was like, “Yeah, sure, why not?” And we hopped on with [20th Television vp casting] Eric Souliere on Zoom and did a reading.

They invited me out to L.A. for an audition at Fox Studios. Nancy Banks was phenomenal for 48 hours before the audition in L.A., preparing me and helping me and getting my confidence there

Nancy Banks is who?

She was the acting coach that was hired for before my L.A. audition. I met with her for two days.

Hired by who?

Hired by Fox to prepare me on how to audition.

OK, let me just stop you there. I know you’re new to Hollywood, but you know that that’s very unusual, right? That they would not hire an acting coach for someone before they’ve actually auditioned. They assume you come in knowing how to act, then maybe get you an acting coach after or whatever. But clearly they seemed to want you enough to hire a coach to help you audition to get the part.

Since I am new, I’ve never asked anyone else about a similar situation, but it does make sense what you’re saying. I assume they saw something in me where if they’re going to spend the money to fly me out there, maybe they want me working with someone that knows what they’re doing for at least a day. I was very grateful whoever made that decision to give me some help with Nancy Banks.

When was the first time you met Ryan Murphy face to face? Was it at that audition in L.A.?

I still have not met Ryan Murphy face to face.

Really? It’s his show.

Correct. But he has a lot of shows. He’s a very busy man.

He didn’t want to see you or meet you in person, give you the stamp of approval?

I hope he would want to meet me. I hope he was just busy. No one told me if he didn’t want to meet me or not.

So who was at that big L.A. audition? It was the showrunners?

Yeah, it was the showrunner, Rashad Raisani, and Eric [Souliere] and Stephanie [Levinson, 20th TV executive vp] from Fox. It was the three of them in there. And then someone recording the audition.

So then you had the audition. Then you’re flying back to Nashville and you get the call.

Yes, that I got the part.

Do you know the history of the part? Was it tailor-written for you?

I was told there was about 1,000 people who auditioned for the part. It was the first one that they started looking to fill and it was the last one they ended up filling.

So you get back to Nashville and then what happens?

I get back to Nashville. They call me and say there’s a cast dinner in an hour. So I run over there; I meet the cast for the first time on Friday evening. Then we started filming the next Thursday. They flew in one of the members of Nancy Banks’ team, the acting coach, and his name is Daniel. And he spent the next four or five days working with me about eight to 10 hours a day, going through 200 pages worth of scripts, going through the basics of acting.

Did you learn anything cool during those lessons? Anything that helped you?

I was just more focused on trying not to die in five days.

Die of what?

Die of a heart attack. Of being overwhelmed or stressed of nervousness. It’s big shoes to fill with the 9-1-1 universe.

I would be intimidated. I mean your co-stars, certainly Chris O’Donnell, these are major guys with a lot of experience under their belt and you’re a complete newbie, so I would be scared.

You’re very correct. Yes. I was terrified. So Daniel and I worked together over those four or five days. He started with the difference between a scene number and a page number. And then we go into the script. Then we go into my point of view. Then we go into talking about Blue as a character. Then we go into technicals of what it entails going on a set and how they do blocking rehearsals and what it all means.

It was just enough where I could get in there for the first week and snap into it. And once they called action, everything else kind of dissipated — most of the fears, most of the thoughts. Because of how real they make it feel with their sets and their 200-person production crew, you’re very much in the zone. Your adrenaline’s going, your heart’s pumping, and so whether the nerves are there or not, it’s a very adrenaline-filled situation.

Maybe I was imagining it, but I felt like between the first and the second episode, you had relaxed a bit.

I think you’re correct in the statement of, I was probably a fair bit more relaxed in episode two than one.

And are you enjoying it? Is it fun? Is it what you expected?

I didn’t have any expectations or any time to think about it, but it’s been one of the best things that’s ever happened to me. It’s been the most fulfilled I’ve ever been in any line of work, in any career. And it makes me extremely happy to go to work every day. I feel like a kid. I’m present for 12 hours. All the things that are difficult about the job — the lack of freedom or time-control of your schedule, your sleep deprivation and the hard work — it all falls to the wayside when you’re there and especially when you’re working around such incredible people and just being able to learn so much and be in so many new situations and learn a new skill. It’s fantastic.

Regarding your co-stars, I mean, a lot of these people have spent years trying to get a break and you sort of show up and get it on your first try. Are they supportive and showing you the ropes, or are they like, “How the hell did you do that?”

I’m sure it may have been more of the latter, even if they didn’t say it to me, especially at the start. But I have felt nothing but kindness and support from not only my co-stars but the entire 200-person production and crew and higher-ups. They played a big part in my confidence throughout the last six months, because I felt all of these people want me to do well.

I definitely could tell when they announced the cast, it seemed like every actor and their mother was angry that they would give a role like this to someone with no experience. And I completely understand if you work for your whole life for something and have not been able to get your break, and then you see this guy who posts shirtless pictures on Instagram coming in and taking your job, they’re completely fair to have their opinion.

But the thing I want to focus on, because I can’t change what people think about me necessarily, is just to do the best job I can on a daily basis and try to make the 9-1-1 audience and universe proud. I want to fill the shoes that were there before me. It’s big stakes. I can’t take too much else into account.

Have you finished filming the season?

We have 18 episodes for the first season and we’ve filmed about 13 of them.

I’ve seen some of the social media stuff you’re still doing. You do a lot of tours of the set and stuff like that.

I have a Patreon, where I post all my behind-the-scenes acting content. It’s the journey of me becoming an actor — the vlogs at 3:00 a.m. of me crying in the first month because I’m so stressed and scared and nervous and don’t know what the heck I’m doing. I don’t think anyone shared that side of a journey like this. And I wanted to document it for myself, but if other people are interested, beautiful.

What does that cost to subscribe to that?

I have a free one, and my paid one’s $9.99 a month. I’ve also started live-streaming on Twitch and answering question and answers from the 9-1-1 audience.

That’s a lot of interfacing with the public. Does ABC or 20th TV want to oversee that or give you any guidelines?

“No spoilers.” That’s their guidance. I think they like it. I think they realize how powerful social media is in regards to even network television. One clip can become a 20-to-50 million-view reel. So I think it’s just in their best interest to have as many people as they can promoting the show.