Patrick J. Adams Explains Why He Was 'Nervous' About Playing John Glenn in 'The Right Stuff'

Patrick J. Adams is dishing on his role in The Right Stuff.

The 38-year-old actor appeared in the virtual Comic-Con @ Home panel on Saturday (July 25) to discuss his upcoming series, which will premiere on Disney+ this fall.

The Right Stuff follows “the lives of ambitious, young astronauts, who became instant celebrities as they risked their lives to be among the first to leave the planet. At the center of the story are Major John Glenn (Adams) and Lieutenant Commander Alan Shepard (Jake McDorman). Members of the Mercury Seven, the elite group of astronauts included Lieutenant Gordon Cooper (Colin O’Donoghue), Wally Schirra (Aaron Staton), Scott Carpenter (James Lafferty), Deke Slayton (Micah Stock) and Gus Grissom (Michael Trotter),” according to Entertainment Tonight.

During the panel, Patrick admitted he was “extremely nervous and freaked out” about portraying John Glenn in the new show.

“I thought, ‘There’s no way I could do this. What have I gotten myself into?’ And then I decided to get to work and took advantage of the enormous amount of information there is about John Glenn,” Patrick said. “I never had the opportunity to play someone where there’s so much written and there’s so much at your disposal. I started rereading [The Right Stuff] and going over the book he wrote [in 2000, John Glenn: A Memoir] and a couple of books that he had written about him.”

“But then I found out about the Ohio State [University] archives that had been maintained and that he played a big role in over the years,” Patrick continued, “and I managed to spend 12 hours in there going through boxes of his stuff.”

During his visit, Patrick found boxes and boxes Major Glenn had written to his wife Annie – played in the show by Nora Zehetner.

“It wasn’t just the information that was contained in the letters, it was the tone of voice, it was the way they spoke to each other, it was the way they referred to each other, it was the things he was thinking about,” Patrick said. “So it was little things like that that I kept putting into the bank.”

You can watch the trailer for The Right Stuff here!