“Yellowstone” star Kelly Reilly thinks the conclusion of the smash-hit Paramount Network show will be bittersweet.
The British actor, who has portrayed Beth Dutton in the neo-Western drama since it debuted in 2018, gave her predictions on how the show will end in a recent behind-the-scenes clip.
“The main theme of protecting and sustaining this way of life in this land is the bottom of everything,” Reilly said in a featurette that appears on the Blu-ray and DVD release of “Yellowstone” season five, part one. “So I don’t know which way it’s going to go but we’re in season five, and who knows what’s in store.”
Of the show’s ending, she said: “Thought it will probably be beautiful and epic, I’m not sure it will be happy.”
The interview was conducted before it was announced that season five would be the show’s very last, and before the SAG-AFTRA strike began.
Reilly emphasized that her predictions are just that, as she doesn’t “have any insight into what’s going to happen.”
The actor said that cocreator and showrunner Taylor Sheridan doesn’t share storyline details ahead of time, something she said makes the process of working on the show “fascinating.”
“We’re all sort of beholden to the vision of the storyteller and we serve the story,” she said. “Who knows what’s going to happen? I find that exciting as an actor.”
Costar Kevin Costner, who plays aging cattle rancher John Dutton in the series, also spoke about where the storylines are heading following season five’s midseason finale.
Costner said that John’s decision to step into the world of politics and become governor of Montana “provides a little bit of drama” that will continue to play out in future episodes.
“He’s not a very good politician. He’s a one-term politician, admittedly, so that makes him a little bit dicey for people to deal with,” Costner said, adding that the career pivot makes sense for his character, because John would do anything to preserve his land and his legacy.
“John has proven time and again that there’s nothing he won’t do to save the ranch even if that means in the twilight of his life, he takes a miserable job that’s going to dominate him for four years,” the actor said. “He didn’t want it to be that way, but that’s the way it was.”
While it was previously announced that the latter half of season five would air in November, that’s looking increasingly unlikely, given that scripts for the final episodes have not yet been written, let alone shot and edited.
In June, Sheridan told The Hollywood Reporter that he had stopped writing “Yellowstone” in solidarity with the ongoing writers’ strike.
The strike is also delaying production on the second season of the prequel series, “1923,” and has put a pin in the development of the upcoming “Yellowstone” spinoff starring Matthew McConaughey.