The 'Glee' Cast Told Ryan Murphy They Didn't Want to Perform a Song, & It Became One of Their Biggest Hits

The cast of Glee got so much right, but Kevin McHale and Jenna Ushkowitz revealed a time that they almost got it very wrong.

During a recent episode of their podcast And That’s What You Really Missed, the duo said that the cast was so against performing one of the songs that was included in an episode that they approached creator Ryan Murphy and asked if it could be pulled.

The “scary” and “embarrassing” conversation did not go their way, and the song was included in the show. It also ended up becoming one of their biggest hits.

Read more about the song that the cast of Glee did not want to perform…

The song in question was “Loser Like Me,” which was the first original song that the cast “wrote” to perform during a competition. It was one of several original tracks, many of which were jokes and gags like the enduring fan-favorite “Trouty Mouth,” included in the episode titled “Original Song.”

Kevin explained that it and “Get It Right” were a test “to see if we could put out original songs.”

“We didn’t like this song, and we were all very concerned,” he admitted.

That led to a conversation with Ryan after a dance rehearsal: “He came in and we had decided to collectively sort of bring up how we were feeling about the song,” the actor recalled. Of course, they didn’t get their way. “He sort of talked us off a ledge and also was like, ‘Well that’s not up to you.’ He didn’t say that in so many words.”

“Loser Like Me” went on to debut at the No. 6 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 and remains one of the show’s best-performing singles to date.

Watching the show back now, Kevin understood that the track made sense “in context with the episode.”

Jenna said that she “blocked this from my memory because it was scary” but agreed that they had hesitations after mostly “doing bangers.”

“It makes me even more embarrassed that we were like, ‘This doesn’t work’ or ‘This won’t work’ or we didn’t like it initially when Max Martin wrote on this song,” Jenna added. If you were unaware, Max is a pop icon responsible for hits such as Britney Spears‘ “…Baby One More Time,” Ariana Grande‘s “No Tears Left to Cry” and Taylor Swift‘s “Blank Space.”

If you missed it, another Glee actor recently explained why their role wasn’t “great for the ego.” We also learned about how the cast’s behavior on set inspired a very popular episode.