Taylor Sheridan Demanded Full Creative Control of Yellowstone Season One—and He Got It
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Taylor Sheridan is one of the biggest names in television at the moment. The creator and driving force behind the mega-hit Yellowstone, as well as a veritable slew of prequels, spin-offs, and other new content (he currently has nine television properties in development for Paramount, a slate even he has called "excessive"), he's become a particularly influential force in the industry. Even before he was one of the hottest names going, though, he was already confident in his creative vision for his properties—and protective of them.
In a new profile in The Atlantic ahead of Yellowstone's season 5 debut, Sheridan reveals that when he reluctantly pitched the first season of Yellowstone to Viacom for their cable channel Paramount Network in 2017, he demanded full creative control right off the bat. "You will have no part in any of this, he told them—except for footing the bill," the article says. "I will write and direct all the episodes of the show. There will be no writers’ room. There will be no notes from studio executives. No one will see an outline."
Sheridan would go on to write and direct every episode for the show's first season, but balked when the network insisted on a writers room for the show's second outing. "Taylor refused to talk to them," a Yellowstone insider told the publication. "He kept saying, ‘It’s weird to have other people write my characters.’ " By the third season, the show was back under Sheridan's exclusive purview.
The profile goes on to reveal a number of other interesting tidbits, including the fact that the idea for Mayor of Kingstown, which he co-created Hugh Dillon, was Sheridan's first script-writing experience (though he shelved the project for years) as well as that Yellowstone was originally bought by HBO (which would go on to create the thematically similar Succession) and hints that the long-gestating 6666 spin-off could be coming next year. However, for fans who have waited with bated breath for news on the future of Yellowstone and its sister properties, perhaps the most interesting hint comes for how Sheridan sees his own creative future.
"It’s a tremendous amount of responsibility … I’m aware of the opportunity, and so I do spread myself thin as a result,” the writer admits, calling his current situation "three-to-five-year thing, at best—at least as far as me writing, directing, editing, casting." He added, "I don’t know that I will ever have this creative freedom again. Hopefully I can ride off into the sunset before something tanks."
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