Maine native Tucker Pillsbury, who performs under the name Role Model, will play a sold-out show in Portland on Friday. (Photo by Chloe Chippendale)
Tucker Pillsbury has a new album, a new movie and a new world tour to promote. But in recent national interviews, he’s made sure to also talk about his love of Maine.
Pillsbury, who performs under the name Role Model, grew up in Cape Elizabeth. On Friday he’ll start his tour with his first Maine concert, at Thompson’s Point in Portland, and release his new album, “Chuck Timely & The Hourglass.” He’s filmed a romcom called “Good Sex” with Natalie Portman, though no release date has been announced.
In interviews with national publications this summer, he’s talked about those things, but has also gone out of his way to shout out his home state. He was especially ebullient about Maine for a cover story interview for Nylon Guys, a culture and lifestyle magazine, published Tuesday. But he’s also mentioned Maine, including his childhood fishing adventures, to Rolling Stone and Esquire.
In the Nylon Guys story, Pillsbury said that living in Los Angeles is hard for him, especially with his parents, siblings and a baby niece still in Maine.
“This time every year, I have a bit of a crisis of like, ‘What am I doing?’ I miss home a lot as soon as summer starts creeping up, and it’s hard for me to focus on anything else other than I want to be home,” said Pillsbury, 29.
He told the magazine that when he visits his family in Cape Elizabeth, he stays in his childhood bedroom. The walls are still covered with animals painted by his mother, Susan Pillsbury, a retired special education teacher. He likes the feeling of “normalcy” he gets in Maine and would eventually like to buy a home there, splitting his time between Maine and Los Angeles.
Tucker Pillsbury performs at the Austin City Limits Music Festival in 2022, wearing a Wiscasset Youth Soccer t-shirt. (Jack Plunkett/Invision/AP)
He said doing a big show in Maine is something he’s “always wanted.” The show at Thompson’s Point sold out — more than 6,500 tickets — almost immediately. Pillsbury is also taking time on Saturday to sign copies of his new album at the Bull Moose music store in South Portland, for 200 fans who buy it ahead of time.
“I love Maine so much, and I think I’m just now beginning to feel loved by it,” he told the magazine.
In some of the photos for the Nylon Guys story, Pillsbury is seen wearing a t-shirt that says “Official Maine T-Shirt” over images of a lobster and a boat. He’s also wearing a Boston Red Sox cap.
Pillsbury has also talked extensively about Maine with the Press Herald in recent years, saying that coming back helps keep him grounded and that he never misses the Independence Day fireworks on Portland’s Eastern Promenade. Several of his tattoos are to remind him of Maine, including a box of strawberries, a lobster and the script P from the Press Herald logo. His publicists had not made him available to talk to the Press Herald as of this writing, though they said they were working on it.
In an interview with Esquire, published in May, Pillsbury said he was going to start fishing again, as a way to relax. It’s something he did growing up in Maine with his father, but his frequent touring hasn’t left him much time for hobbies.
“I’m gonna go to a fishing store after I speak to you because I want to get a new fishing pole,” Pillsbury told the Esquire interviewer. “It’s my new hobby. I grew up fishing and my mom recently visited me and realized I don’t have any hobbies, so suggested fishing again.”
He said he’s found a spot on a river near his Los Angeles home. He goes at night and likes that there’s no one around and he has the spot to himself. But that might also be because “no one really goes fishing in Los Angeles,” he said.
Pillsbury told Rolling Stone, in an interview published in June, that he planned to end his practice of bringing a guest on stage at each show to dance while he sings “Sally.” When he played MGM Music Hall at Fenway in Boston in April 2025, his mom was the “Sally” guest. He told Rolling Stone that he thinks the routine has run its course.
“I think it’s good to know when to end a bit. If this album wasn’t good, I’d be like, ‘Yeah, we should probably keep the Sally bit going, I gotta sell tickets,’” he told Rolling Stone.
Pillsbury’s fame is such that people noticed when he did not attend the July 3 wedding of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce at Madison Square Garden in New York. Actress Dakota Johnson, who Pillsbury is dating, did attend. Johnson also appears on Pillsbury’s new album, as part of a spoken word bridge on the song “Love I You.”
“I couldn’t go,” he told Nylon Guys. “I was busy in the middle of an album rollout, but it looked amazing.”
