After a year of utter desperation, Jo Dee Messina's career has started to soar.

TV Guide (May 1-7, 1999) - Jo Dee Messina wants to be an actress, but on her own terms. The country music sensation - whose platinum album, I'm Alright, has earned her three ACM nominations - is in a San Francisco bar filming a scene for the CBS cop drama Nash Bridges. Making her acting debut in the episode (scheduled to air Friday, April 30) as a sweet, struggling country singer isn't much of a stretch. But that's the way Messina wanted it. CBS initially offered her a juicier part - the sexy getaway driver for an all-girl robbery ring - but Messina politely declined.

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