Granting Wishes

Singer Amy Grant nestles in the corner of a comfortable burgundy sofa, enjoying the late Friday afternoon calm in her spacious Nashville, Tenn., home. Like any mother of four, she knows the quiet won’t last long.

Son Matt, 18, is upstairs with friends, while Sarah, 12, is babysitting Corrina, 4. Daughter Millie, 15, is visiting with friends in the yard, and husband, country singer Vince Gill, 48, just left the house with his daughter, Jenny, 23.

"This is just a great time," Grant says. "It’s my favorite decade so far. Your 40s are so great because you’re young enough to still have hopes and dreams ahead and a lot of anticipation for life yet to be lived, but definitely old enough to appreciate days when you wake up and feel good. You have enough friends and family to realize how quickly it comes and goes."

During the last few years, Grant, 44, who has sold more than 25 million records, scaled back her work commitments, including performing fewer concerts, to spend more time with her active, blended family. However, when she was asked to host the new NBC show Three Wishes, which debuts Friday, Sept. 23, at 9 p.m. ET, she found it an offer too tempting to pass up.

During this heartwarming reality show, dubbed one of the "most promising" new fall series by Entertainment Weekly, Grant leads Three Wishes contributors Carter Oosterhouse, Eric Stromer and Diane Mizota to small towns across America to grant three wishes at each stop. This season, the show will visit LeMars, Iowa (pop. 9,241), Farwell, Texas (pop. 1,364), and Clovis, N.M. (pop. 32,667). The wishes are from individuals (for themselves or loved ones) and families, or are made on behalf of the entire community, and range from the lighthearted to life-changing. The first show, taped in Sonora, Calif. (pop. 4,423), features an extraordinary young girl who’s been in a terrible accident, a boy who wants to thank the role model who stepped into his life after the death of his father and a sick high school coach who has a wish for her students.

"I kept telling my mom and dad, and my kids too, that I felt like I was just following a breadcrumb trail," says Grant of her decision to take the job. "You know, some things in life feel like an uphill battle, like you’re rolling a boulder uphill, and some things in life just feel like a very natural progression of one step leading to the next. When we did that first show, I had this uncanny sense that so many other elements of my life, that have been a part of my life for 20-plus years, prepared me to feel very comfortable in that setting."

When it came time to decide whether to host Three Wishes, Grant consulted with her children—for the first time in her career. "I did it individually," she says. "I told them if it was a bomb, I don’t want them to be embarrassed, and if it was a success, I don’t want then to feel our lives are even more public.

"I’ve worked for their whole lives and if a record is going well, we don’t light candles at dinner, and if it’s going poorly, we don’t hang the flag at half-mast. The family just carries on pretty oblivious to any work of mine. It’s always been that way and I love that. But with this, I knew that it could get time-consuming. And they all said, ‘Go for it! It sounds like a great thing.’"

Grant says she was attracted by the show’s message—celebrating those who come together to help each other—because it offers an alternative to many of the other reality shows, which focus on beauty, money or succeeding at the expense of others.

"Hopefully, people will watch this show and realize that they don’t have to be a multi-millionaire to help somebody out," she says. "All you have to do is be aware of a need and then just do what you can."

When Grant met with NBC executives about doing the show, she was asked, "What do you want out of this?" She told them, "I want the person who is sitting at home on a Friday night eating popcorn and watching TV to reconsider the potential of their own impact and be inspired by it."

Making dreams a reality

Grant begins each production week by stopping in every bakery, coffee shop, antique store and bookstore along the town’s Main Street to invite residents down to the wish tent, where she and the other hosts listen to those hoping to participate in the show. "The whole environment of this show is unique because it begins with people being somewhat vulnerable enough to say, ‘I have a wish,’" says Grant, who won’t reveal any granted wishes. "I don’t have final say-so in what wishes are selected, which is kind of nice, so that I can have a sympathetic ear for everybody that walks up."

It’s that sympathetic ear and warm smile that made Grant perfect for this job, says Andrew Glassman, the show’s co-executive producer. "She is a friend, listener and advocate, and people naturally open up to her to share themselves," he says. "Amy’s dedication and warmth shine right through the screen.

"When we were trying to think of the right person to host Three Wishes, we made a very conscious decision not to seek out a ‘TV personality.’ Rather, Amy is a real person with incredible life experience who happens to also have the gift of her music. She is a generous and caring person—we couldn’t have hoped for more!"

Grant has been touched by the intimate conversations she’s had with strangers, whether it’s a man who wanted his 90-year-old grandmother to take a hot air balloon ride or a woman who shared her story of sexual abuse in hopes of getting a sexual abuse center established. "One that just broke my heart was when I said, ‘Tell me what your wish is,’ and the woman said, ‘I just want my husband to find me beautiful,’" Grant says. "I just got this big lump in my throat and I thought, ‘This is just about the most vulnerable thing I’ve heard all day.’

"You just can’t believe the caliber of things people ask you for," she says. "Some of them are so enriching. I just say like a mantra in my head, ‘At least we’re doing three.’ But so many of them are just filled with good will. When you see the show, you think, ‘Of course, they picked these!’"

Learning to help others

Grant, who was born in Augusta, Ga., and raised in Nashville, Tenn., is the youngest of four daughters of Dr. Burton Grant, a respected Nashville physician, and Gloria, a stay-at-home mother. "It was instilled in me that meal time was very important," she says. "I learned that family is important and that our relationship with God is important. I think an example of giving has always been set before me and my family."

For instance, her great-grandparents willed their Nashville farm and property to a local Christian college. "I haven’t thought about it until today, but I think that was very shaping to a young mind," she says. "My parents were that way and I look at my immediate family. I have a brother-in-law who is so generous and always helping people in need.

"I think more than anything, it makes a person feel good. It makes you feel good for just a minute to buy a new outfit. Whatever that little kick is that you get from doing something for yourself, it truly does not last. When you do something for someone else, every time you think about it, it puts a smile on your face. It’s like a ripple effect."

Although Grant is poised to become TV’s newest star, professionally she is still, first and foremost, a singer. She began her recording career in Christian music at age 16 and quickly emerged as one of the genre’s top stars. The five-time Grammy winner became a household name as a pop star with the release of her 1991 album, Heart in Motion, which sold 5 million copies and contained four Top 5 hits, including Baby, Baby and Every Heartbeat.

Despite her pop success, she’s never abandoned her Christian music roots and recently released Rock of Ages, the second collection of hymns she’s recorded. "It speaks to my soul," she says of gospel music. "Songs about faith are just not necessarily ones that have the answers. Not everything I’ve recorded has been about faith, but some are about asking questions in life, why things are the way they are."

Grant had a few questions about her own life during the late 1990s, when she experienced trouble in her marriage to songwriter Gary Chapman, the father of her three oldest children. The couple divorced in 1999 and she married Gill a year later.

"In a family, a wall always tends to divide the business of parents from the business of children," she says. "You go through a family tragedy, whether it is death or divorce, and you shake everything up and that wall, in a best-case scenario, comes down. Very honest conversations happen about failure and forgiveness and expectations and honesty. Sometimes I look at families that have gone through really hard things and even though they wish that thing hadn’t happened, they’ll say, ‘But the payoff is great.’

"I was sitting in a Sunday School class and our preacher said, ‘Some of the hardest years of my life were when we thought we were going to lose our son to leukemia. That was not the way to end his high school years, but I had a relationship with my son that I never would have had with a normal 12th grader.’ So hard times can do an amazing thing."

Beverly Keel is American Profile's Entertainment Editor.

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