Happy Thursday, Yellowstone fans, and with the Golden Globe win of Kevin Costner during Tuesday night’s award ceremony; it is a happy week indeed. Fans are still raving about the win for Costner as he continues to breathe life into one of the most compelling characters in television history. John Dutton is so many things all at once, but above all else, he’s a father who wants something to leave to those he loves when his time here is up. That very idea is the continuing story for each branch of the Dutton family tree so far; this family would go to hell and back to ensure they’d still be a family at the end of the day. To ensure that there would still be love for generations and a home for them to call their own. Brandon Sklenar is opening up about playing Spencer Dutton, our new favorite heartthrob, and Taylor Sheridan is sharing the importance of the specific time period the latest Dutton prequel focuses upon. You know what to do from here: grab your Yellowstone (and 1923)-loving bestie and your drink of choice because we’re riding in.
Brandon Sklenar opens up about playing Spencer Dutton and how Rip and Beth come into the picture
Brandon Sklenar plays the ultra suave and almost painfully handsome Spencer Dutton in Yellowstone‘s latest prequel, 1923, and how he breathes life into character gives fans something to look forward to each Sunday. He’s unlike many of the Dutton family members we’ve met before, farther away from it all somehow, but he’s still deeply connected to them. As the son of James and Margret Dutton, he’s an integral part of the storyline — but it’s almost begrudgingly at times.
Not because he doesn’t love the people in his family, it’s because he’s trying to run from himself and the trauma he’s experienced. It’s hard for him to reconcile with what life is and the ways it’s brought him so much pain. It’s as if he believes that the quicker he runs, the further he’ll be able to get from himself.
In a chat with USA Today, he elaborated more on those character traits of Spencers and also opened up about the comparisons between Rip and Beth and Spencer and Alex and the depths of passion and fire that exist between them.
“I’ve heard the Rip and Beth comparisons. That comes from this soul connection that doesn’t make much sense; they both know it’s not smart to be together. It’s something you can’t explain or put words to.”
While things obviously differ between both pairings, stuff with Alex and Spencer started with a bit more of a need to move quickly. After all, she was running away from her fiance to be with him. Their love affair is still unfolding, but it’s been an incredibly wild ride so far; when they first met, there was chaos between them, something so hot they knew they shouldn’t touch it but dared to try it anyway.
As Alex ran away from the life she knew to adventure with Spencer, she was letting go of all abandonment and running to freedom for the first time in her life. It’s a feeling she’s still chasing through every moment she shares with him, and he’s experiencing something new, too: the desire to want to give his heart away for the first time.
We can’t wait to see how it continues to unfold.
Taylor Sheridan on picking just the right moment for Yellowstone’s latest prequel
Taylor Sheridan is at the heart of the Yellowstone cinematic universe, and the stories he’s crafting for a family of ranch owners have captivated audiences worldwide. It’s not easy to describe what he’s building; you must experience it for yourself, but we can tell you one thing — it’s one hell of a story.
After the first prequel for Yellowstone, fans were transported a couple of decades into the future for a continued story of the ranch, its inhabitants, and those who wished to take it away from the Dutton family.
Speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, Sheridan notes that it was essential to pick the year 1923 for several reasons, one of which is that it gave us insight into characters we’d met in passing before. While we may not have been overly familiar with them, we knew their existence and learned some of their stories.
“I chose that moment in time (year 1923) to peek back in because you’re seeing the children that we’ve met in 1883 attempting to raise another generation of Duttons.”
The next generation of the Dutton family can only grow because of the strength and love of Cara and Jacob and the way they worked hard to keep their family together. When Margaret Dutton wrote to Jacob asking him to help, he stopped everything to be there for her; when he found her after an untimely and heartbreaking death, he took in the children she shared with James and gave them a place to have a second chance.
Sheridan further elaborated by saying that the other part of what drew him to the early 1920s in Montana was that two very different things were happening simultaneously. It was a time of overwhelming turmoil and pain alongside expansion and the birth of a technology that would go on to change everything.
“A time of great drought, at a time of Prohibition, at a time of all this expansion — the Wild West was truly becoming a relevant center of resources.”
Cara spoke more about the resources and growth in 1923 with her husband in episode three of the series, commenting on the fact that razors were being marketed to women. Such things were unheard of back then, and she couldn’t fathom what other newness would come in and attempt to change everything they were accustomed to. It was the dawn of a new age, but there was more to it than that — they weren’t just fighting change; they were fighting what threatened to make their way of life obsolete.
You can catch up with 1923 as the first episodes are streaming on Paramount Plus now, with a new episode airing on Feb. 5.