Reba McEntire's Worst Hair Transformations: From Her Sitcom To The Voice

Reba McEntire has undergone a remarkable transformation during her four decades in the spotlight. Perhaps the most notable change over the years has been her hair — it has seemingly grown bigger and bigger in line with her celebrity status. Like many of her fellow Nashville stars, McEntire’s country music career didn’t have a glamorous beginning. However, it was kickstarted after country legend Red Steagall spotted the then-19-year-old singing at the rodeo in 1974. And once she was discovered, it was full speed ahead. McEntire recorded a demo, signed a deal with Mercury Records, and released her first album, imaginatively titled “Reba McEntire,” in 1977. The rest is history.

McEntire is a bonafide music superstar with 58 albums under her rhinestone belt. She’s been crowned “Best Female Vocalist” by the Country Music Association four times and inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. McEntire is also an accomplished actor with a self-titled sitcom and a slew of movie roles. In 2023, she added celebrity coach to her resume after joining NBC’s “The Voice.”

Still, she’s equally famed for her signature red locks, voluminous styles, and iconic mullet. Oh, and lest we forget: her hair pieces and wigs, for better or for worse. From country girl curls to big, bigger, even bigger, and bouncy to McEntire’s bizarre 2024 Emmys wig, we’re looking at her worst hair transformations.

Reba McEntire is a country and western icon — right up there with Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, and Tammy Wynette. But her hair has often taken center stage; over the years, it’s become iconic in its own right. McEntire’s love of rocking a business up front, party-in-the-back is as country as trucks, heartbreak, mamma, and ice-cold Bud.

Her mullets are legendary, and many of them would make even Billy Ray Cyrus tip his Stetson. They often feature front and center on McEntire’s album covers. One of the most famous is the colossal mullet silhouette artwork on her 1979 release, “Out of a Dream.” Still, the McEntire mullet to beat all mullets likely graces the “Reba Sweet Sixteen” album. The curls are curlin’, the big is biggin’, and the flames are flamin’. It’s pretty epic, all in all. “Look at that hair! Girl, I’m telling you what. I don’t know what I was thinking!” McEntire said of the cover in an interview on “The Drew Barrymore Show” in August 2024.

McEntire’s hair color is as famed as the many iconic styles she’s had. And it’s something she’s been so gosh darn proud of since she was knee-high to a lamb. “I loved my red hair. My mom was a redhead, so I felt she gave me her red hair. I’ve always been very, very proud of it,” she told the Dallas Voice in June 2015.

Reba McEntire isn’t a gal who does things in halves — she likes to go big or go home. And if you want any proof, you need to look no further than her hair. McEntire has taken big hair to whole new levels over the years, giving even an ’80s Jon Bon Jovi a run for his hairspray. “My hair was so big back in those days that my fans could recognize me just from my silhouette. But I didn’t just wake up like that. It took hot rollers, more hot rollers, teasing, and enough hair spray to choke a horse,” McEntire wrote in her 2023 memoir and cookbook, “Not That Fancy.”

McEntire admitted that although her massive mop was a firm fan favorite, it initially hampered her chances to break into the movies. She wrote that producers were wary of hiring somebody “known for her big stage shows and even bigger hair.”

The singer fondly recalls her big-hair days, but sadly, she’s not allowed to scale such heady heights anymore, despite her best endeavors. “I can’t get [my stylist] Brett Freedman to get it that high anymore! My good friend Shane Tarleton is always saying, ‘Get that big hair out. Jack it up to Jesus!'” McEntire told the Dallas Voice in June 2015.

Reba McEntire went from really huge hair to next to no hair in one quick chop in 1996. Still, it wasn’t easy to part with her signature style. McEntire’s management and record companies were less than pleased by the decision, and the transition had to be carefully planned.

“I cut it just because I wanted to, and it took me a long time to talk everybody into it. So I cut it in June. So, we had to go to Cancun, Mexico, to do a photo shoot for the album [“What If It’s You”] coming out next and all the publicity photos. And we did teasers like me sitting on the beach with my short hair and just from the back,” she told Country 102.5 in September 2020.

Meanwhile, McEntire was forced to take desperate measures leading up to the big reveal. “I had to wear a baseball cap with a ponytail sewn in the back and then wear wigs and tail. That was from June on the photoshoot all the way up until the CMAs. That’s when I came out with my hair cut off. But I’d had it cut off for six months,” she explained.

Reba McEntire’s big chop soon grew into the style everyone is more familiar with today. However, it didn’t get there immediately. Initially, McEntire went through a Carol Brady phase with a flat, up-flick ‘do in the aughts, which is when she was starring on her sitcom “Reba.” However, given her big hair history, it was really only a matter of time before the flat regained volume. McEntire reflected on her oomph-less days in a throwback Thursday Facebook post in March 2016.

“We shot this in LA around 2004. I didn’t like my hair that flat…but everyone loved it so I gave ’em one set up with it. Looking back, it wasn’t so bad…but this gal likes VOLUME,” she captioned a pic of her reclining on a sofa.

McEntire’s fans rushed to share the lock love.” I like volume too Reba. If it is flat, it sure isn’t me! I have red, natural curley hair too, and I like it ‘fluffy!’ You are beautiful, and enjoy everything you do!” one shared. “I love your hair any way! Look perfect no matter what!! But my favorite hair has to be a loose curl, or your natural curly hair:-) Mine is just straight, I can’t get any volume out of mine!” another wrote.

A year after she joined “The Voice,” Reba McEntire’s hair had everyone’s heads turning at the 2024 Primetime Emmys — sadly, for all the wrong reasons. McEntire appeared to be rocking a wig, which was nothing new for her, but the one she’d selected was far from flattering. With a hairline set way back, it gave McEntire the appearance of having a seemingly never-ending forehead, a problem that she has at the best of times.

“As Sam would say, ‘That’s not a forehead. That’s a 5-head!!!'” she captioned a December 2015 Facebook photo of her with her hair pulled back off her face. Still, McEntire’s Emmys look was more of a six-seven. It’s likely she didn’t care what anybody thought either way, though. Over time, McEntire has developed her style to the point where it’s, well, her style. And, if people don’t like it, they can lump it.

“It took me a while to gain that confidence to stand up to a professional stylist, hair and makeup person and say, ‘That’s not me. I don’t like that.’ And they’d say, ‘Well, yeah, you just sit here, and we’ll make sure you look just right.’ I said, ‘Well, make me look like me,'” she told People in April 2024.