Texas TV Force Taylor Sheridan Reveals More New Shows, Major Hollywood Star Team Ups
The Western World Maker is On a Roll
BY Courtney Dabney // 02.17.22Taylor Sheridan is one of the world's busiest TV show runners, but he's not all hat. (Courtesy Greeley Hat Works.)
In a promotional video dropped on his 1883 TV show’s official Instagram page, Fort Worth’s own writer/director/actor/cowboy Taylor Sheridan divulged the many irons he has in the fire. Fans are on the verge of a tidal wave of new Sheridan TV series.
The Yellowstone franchise has proven so wildly successful for both Sheridan and Paramount+ that new projects, spinoffs, stories and scripts are now flooding in. And Hollywood heavyweights are lining up to work with Texas’ own prolific creator and show runner. Case in point? Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson’s cameos in 1883. Now many more stars are about to get their chance.
Besides 1883, Sheridan also debuted Mayor of Kingstown last year. Following the McLusky family in Kingstown, Michigan, where the business of incarceration is the only thriving industry, the show — starring Jeremy Renner, Dianne Wiest and Kyle Chandler — is such a hit that a second season is already being worked on.
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Sheridan is also already creating a sequel show to 1883 called 1932.
Of course, 1883 ― parts of which were shot in the Fort Worth Stockyards and around the Granbury Square with stars Faith Hill, Tim McGraw, Sam Elliott and Isabel May ― is the prequel/origin story about the arrival of the Dutton family of Yellowstone and how they came to be owners of their epic acreage and ranch.
After the family’s harrowing journey to build a new life in untamed Montana, 1932 will explore the next generation of the Dutton family ― smack dab in the middle of the Great Depression.
“With Yellowstone, I had built out this backstory of where the Dutton family came from and with 1932, I chose that moment in time to peek back in, because you’re seeing the children we’ve met in 1883, now attempting to raise another generation of Dutton, at a time of the Wild West becoming a playground for the elite from the East,” Sheridan says.
Another old West tale, will be the story of Bass Reeves, who will be portrayed by British actor David Oyelowo. Oyelowo first burst on the scene with his portrayal of Martin Luther King Jr. in 2014’s Selma, and hasn’t slowed down since.
“As far as Bass Reeves goes, that’s a parallel world,” Sheridan says. “In the 1880s, Bass Reeves who’s the first African American Marshall west of the Mississippi, policing the entire Oklahoma Territories.”
Oyelowo is thrilled with the part and being part of this new Taylor Sheridan limited series. “This is the guy the Lone Ranger was based upon who got white-washed out of history,” he says. “I can’t wait to get on that horse and tell this story.”
Sylvester Stallone is also entering the Sheridan verse, playing a lifetime gangster in The Tulsa Kings. His character’s story begins after serving a 25-year prison stint to protect his bosses. He’s ready to get back to business.
Sheridan is adding plenty of high-wattage women power too. Nicole Kidman will be an executive producer and Zoe Saldana is already set to star in Sheridan’s new Lioness series.
“Lioness is an actual program between the CIA and Special Forces, that truly, no one knows about,” Sheridan says. “This is a deep dive in the way with which espionage and the military have blurred.”
Finally, Taylor Sheridan will be rolling out Land Man, a new series developed for Billy Bob Thornton, who also portrayed a Fort Worth legend (Sheriff Jim Courtright) in 1883. In Land Man, Thornton will play a crisis manager for a modern day oil company. The show is based off the podcast Boomtown, which chronicles the oil boom in West Texas.
“It’s about the world of the oil business that we generally don’t see,” Thornton says in the Sheridan verse promo. “When you see writing that good, that really excites you.”
These will be like long-form movies, shown in one hour increments, from Sheridan on Paramount+. If you thought we had a lot of Taylor Sheridan right now, just wait. This creative Texan is only getting started.