WeGo bus driver sings ‘My Girl’ to the Easter Bunny outside the Hermitage Hotel
WeGo bus driver sings ‘My Girl’ to the Easter Bunny outside the Hermitage Hotel
Dee Patel, Submitted
Photographer Timothy White’s celebrity portraits are now on display at the Drusie & Darr restaurant in Nashville’s Hermitage Hotel.The permanent collection features images of stars like Nicole Kidman, Keith Urban, James Brown, and Dolly Parton.White shared personal stories behind many of the photos, such as shooting James Brown the day he was released from prison.The exhibition is a collaboration between White and Michelin-starred chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten.
Nicole Kidman’s stare pierces the room. Neither smiling nor frowning, her gaze seems one of purpose.
On the other side of the room, Keith Urban looks down, his hair tumbling across his face.
There is mostly silence between them. And the hum of the kitchen ahead of dinner service at Drusie & Darr by Jean-George, the formal restaurant at the historic Hermitage Hotel.
“My archive is voluminous,” said Timothy White, the photographer behind the images of Kidman and Urban (selected and positioned long before the recent divorce news) and 20 others now gracing the restaurant’s walls. “There’s a story behind each one.”
Indeed.
The exhibit is now a permanent collection at the historic five-star hotel in downtown Nashville.
The image of James Brown was shot the day after Brown was released from prison after serving about two years on assault, drug possession and vehicular charges.
“I was sent by Rolling Stone to shoot him in prison, which I did. And then they sent me back the day he got out of prison,” White said. “He showed up out of prison wearing that ascot and the jewelry and the whole thing. He took me to Augusta, GA and showed me the old neighborhood. People were coming out of their houses, people from his past who knew him. It was a really, really special moment for me, being such a fan.”
Brown took White on a very personal tour, too.
“He took me to his offices, he took me to his house to show me the pickup truck that was bullet-riddled from when the police arrested him,” White said, referring to the infamous 1988 incident.
White photographed Julia Roberts in front of a pile of tires because why not. Harrison Ford is on horseback and Brad Pitt poses by a motorcycle. He recalled how gracious Roy Orbison was, what fun Dolly Parton was, how Shania Twain was game for posing in a chilly lake in the Adirondacks.
“It was summer, but it was chilly,” he said. “It was sunrise. She jumped in the water and allowed me to do that.”
Ray Charles beams with ebullience.
“It wasn’t what I said,” White said. “I brought music that he hadn’t heard in a long time. It was his music, and it was like from the 50s. He recognized it and it really made him light up.”
White and Jean-Georges Vongerichten gathered with invited guests to unveil the collection on Oct. 21.
“I would love to cook for them,” Vongerichten said during an interview the following day. “I feel like I’m cooking for them every night.”
While Vongerichten signed copies of his newly released “Home Cooking with Jean-Georges: My Favorite Simple Recipes: A Cookbook,” White gave The Tennessean a guided tour of the collection. The stroll past images of Aretha Franklin, Miley Cyrus, Whitney Houston, Sophia Loren, Jon Bon Jovi and others was a movable feast of celebrity trivia.
“Both JG and I are storytellers in a way,” White said of the Michelin-starred chef.
The 1989 photo of Paul McCartney “hitchhiking” on a Toronto street, for example, happened after White spent a week on the rocker’s tour. The image, which graced the cover of Rolling Stone, came together on the way to the airport on the last day.
“It’s the history of Nashville and entertainment,” White said of the collection, noting artists’ various connections to Music City. McCartney played a concert at The Pinnacle in Nashville on Nov. 6. An exhibition of his photographs from 1963-64 will be on at The Frist Museum through Jan. 16, 2026. And he once wrote a song while sitting at a bar in Printers Alley.
“For more than 114 years, The Hermitage Hotel has been a stage for history and a home for visionaries, artists and leaders,” Managing Director Dee Patel said in a statement. “Timothy White’s portraits capture the same spirit of influence and artistry that has always lived within these walls.”