Ryan Murphy spills the beans on “Glee” guest stars [Susan Boyle! Cheyenne Jackson!), plots, CDs etc

Glee creator Ryan Murphy was in a very chatty mood yesterday during and after a session with journalists at the TV Critics Association Summer Press Tour in Beverly Hills.

I’ve already written about his plans to write a show for Kristen Chenoweth and his dissing of ABC’s Modern Family for not allowing its gay couple to kiss!

But there is more, so much more. And here is all of it for my fellow Gleeks:

SUE SYLVESTER: “She’s meaner than ever. I love the little soft moments we get from Jane but this year she’s on a bender, particularly in the first five [episodes]. We;re doing an episode where the kids sing songs about spirituality and she has a real bee in her bonnet about the separation of church and state which I think is a fascinating and very logical and real thing for Jane’s character to talk about. And we find out why she thinks that.”

KURT HUMMEL: I think Mike O’Malley’s character [of Kurt’s father] needs to really learn more about the Kurt-Finn relationship and learn more about Kurt’s feelings. and that’s something we’re going to do a whole episode about. Kurt’s going to deal with the whole idea of young, romantic love. I think it;s very difficult for that character in his high school environment. I don’t think he knowns anybody else like him.”

“I think the storyline is for me is that the father did not know the depth of Kurt’s romantic feelings for Finn so that’s what’s going to come out and then of course he’s going to have an opinion about it. So that to me is what that story’s about.”

They are going to explore Finn”s side of the story and what he feels has happened: “I love that storyline.”

Kurt’s boyfriend: “Has not been cast. That’s sort of one of those characters that I have to find an actor that I really love and go after but I haven’t found that person yet but I’m doing it this year.”

GUEST STARS: “I really do love how we do the casting on the show because for the most part we really do pull from the Broadway community. Cheyenne Jackson is coming on this year who is a great Broadway star. He’s playing the coach of Vocal Adrenaline. And John Stamos is coming on the show to sort of be Matt Morrison’s rival. John has been in four big Broadway musicals and constantly sends me clips of him in Cabaret wearing almost nothing saying, ‘I’d like to do this.” We really love that triple-threat of actor-singer-dancer.”

“It is true that [Javier Bardem will] he will guest. “He requested it, it’s in the back half of the season. … Javier watches a movie a night, every night. He watched the first 13 episodes on DVD and he became obsessed with it and said it was like crack. And he’s such a ham that it totally makes sense to me that he would want to sing and dance. I love him because he’s a sweet, sweet guy and very funny. I think he’s going to play some demented Spanish rock star substitute teacher.”

“Susan [Boyle] is on the same label as us and I guess is a fan of the show and she’s coming out with a Christmas album. So the story I want to do at our Christmas episode is to have Kurt give her some kind of fantastic makeover and have her sing a song that’s from her album on the show. … I don’t think I’m going to give her monologues and arias but I think she’s a character and I love what she represents. I think what she represents is what the show represents so I’ll just talk to her and say, ‘What are you comfortable doing?'”

Jonathan Groff is going to do two episodes in the spring, Kristen Chenoweth has to finish her run in Promises, Promises but she will be back as April.

Jennifer Lopez? “Yes, I’d love for her to do it although I don’t know if this American Idol thing is happening and if she can.”

SEASON 2 PLANS: “I think we had such a whirlwind of a year and we didn’t know what we were doing when we started. We were kind of making it up as we went along. But the one thing that really clicked for me was when we went out on tour, we instantly sold out which is amazing.” He noticed  how some of the secondary fan clubs had these mini fan clubs: “I felt like instead of going bigger and over-stuffing season 2 which people would expect us to do, lets go under it, let’s really sort of dwell on these supporting characters. The Santana character, the Brittany character, the Li Chang character, the Tina character. We’re giving all those actors big storylines this year because I think people want to know about them.”

“Last year, because we were with Idol in the second half of the season, I personally kind of blew it out – the Madonna episode had nine numbers. “We’re scaling back a little bit and concentrating on the stories and now I think we’re going to do 5-6 songs.”

IN THE MAIL: Paul McCartney sent Ryan a mix tape that arrived unexpectedly in the mail: “It just sort of came out of the blue. It was in a package and handwritten and it had two CDs and it said, ‘Hi Ryan, I hope you’ll consider some of these songs for Glee, Paul … I know that he … is a fan of the show. I was gobsmacked.”

MERCHANDISING: “Of all the things I approve, I turn down 10.” One of the things that we’re going to do that I’m very excited about is we’re going to have Jane Lynch’s character Sue Sylvester wrote her own autobiography …  “Last year we did 4 or 5 [CDs], this year I think we’ll do less. We’ll probably do volume one for fall and volume two for spring.”

GLEE PHENOMENON: When they knew they were a phenomenon was what they call “The Big O” weekend which included an appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show and a visit to The White House: “It was sort of an amazing experience and I had a meeting with the kids in my office and the meeting was simply, ‘Let’s go around the room and talk about where we were and where we were working a year ago.’ And that’s really all we did and most of the kids didn’t have job, one was working at a gas station. They really wort of got back on touch with who they were and where they came from and why they were doing it.”

“They are sweet and lovely kids and I think they got sucked into something I don’t think that they knew was going to be so big. The fact that they’re all so close and tight helps them keep their heads on straight.”

BRITNEY SPEARS EPISODE: He just started directing the Britney Spears episode on Monday “which is why I look like hell.” “She is arguably the most important female other than Lady Gaga I think of the last 10 years. So we’re sort of doing an episode not only about her music but about her public image. … But also, it’s a show designed to sort of show off the skills of Heather Morris who plays Brittany.”

“Heather’s thrilled, that was her dream. Heather was a back-up dancer for Beyonce and her dream was to become an actress and she’s such a great actress because she doesn’t really know what she’s doing in some weird way, she’s so natural; and funny. I did a big scene this morning with Heather .. she’;s very, very excited. She’s got a great work ethic, you know all dancers do.”

He said interaction with Britney Spears and her camp has been “great. It was her idea. She loves what the show’s about, that the show’s about paying tribute to pop culture in a very sort of very loving, respectful, kind way and so she responded to that.”

BUSY MAN: “Everything in my life, Glee, Eat, Pray Love, Nip/Tuck have all happened at the same time. I’m just really grateful. Sunday, he had a screening of Eat, Pray Love for the Glee cast: “They all loved it and have been twittering all day.”

AMERICAN IDOL: Did Fox float the idea of him judging American Idol? “Yes they did actually. I cannot comment on that.”

EMMY NIGHT: “I have no idea what I’m wearing. I begged the other executive producers to all wear track suits and go as Sue Sylvester and so far they’re like, ‘Okay we’ll think about that and I’m like, ‘Wait, how did I get so brave?’ That’s my dream. … I think Mr. Tom Ford might whip something up for me.”

Glee clubs are growing, starting on their own, letter from lady in Oregon who said their glee club was only arts program not cut.’