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Billy Bob Thornton Sees Longevity With ‘Landman’ Series

Billy Bob Thornton Sees Longevity With ‘Landman’ Series

Deep in the heart of Texas, cowboys, cattle and rodeos may come to mind. However man of earthNew series co-created by Christian Wallace and yellowstone boss Taylor SheridanHe wants viewers to think about Texas tea and black gold, too, with his new broadcast offering about the oil business in which he stars Billy Bob Thornton.

Based on the story of journalist-screenwriter Wallace. Boomtown podcast from Imperative Entertainment and Texas Monthly, Paramount+ series explores the multibillion-dollar oil industry in West Texas in a storytelling style that will remind viewers of Sheridan’s mega-hit Paramount Network epic. yellowstone. In 2019, the podcast focused on the Permian Basin in West Texas.

Although the oil fields, known as the “patch,” produced significant amounts of product and paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to the lowest workers on the fields, the community in West Texas also faced high rents, overcrowded schools, and some problems with the oil fields. It’s one of the deadliest things a person can do. Death was, and still is, a common occurrence for those working the patch.

In a recent conversation with Hollywood ReporterThornton explained where her character fits. In the series, he plays Tommy Norris, the manager and “fixer” of the fictional oil company owned by billionaire boss Monty Miller (Jon Hamm).

“Yeah, that’s essentially it,” Thornton said, agreeing with the idea of ​​his character being a mechanic. “The landman is the person who secures the lease for the land and is then responsible for managing the crews that work on that land. He’s also responsible for making sure his boss, the owner of the oil company, makes money; so ‘fixer’ is a good way of putting it. It’s a big job. It’s a lot.” “It’s a big responsibility. There’s a lot of driving in your truck. We’ll be going out to the oil fields a lot. We’ll be meeting your boss at his mansion a lot.”

An interesting aspect of Thornton’s character is explored in the first scene of the first episode, when Norris is held hostage in a shack in the middle of nowhere, chained to a chair with a hood over his face. It is obvious that he was beaten. As the scene progresses, viewers discover that Norris is there to negotiate land rights with a cartel that wants to sell drugs on private roads that pass through valuable oil fields. The relationships between cartels and oil companies puzzled Thornton a bit, but he learned that such situations were not that far-fetched.

“Tommy has to deal with a lot of different people working in close proximity to each other,” Thornton explained. “Cattlemen have their own business. Oil guys have their thing, but it’s probably an easier relationship because it’s just a business thing that you can sort of work out and maybe you don’t always see eye to eye.”

He continued: “But when it comes to a cartel, it’s a different story because there is danger involved. One of the things that I didn’t know before I started working on this – I knew some things about the oil business – I didn’t realize how these cartels would sometimes use this land. They’re almost like strange bedfellows. Like, ‘We’re sharing this.’ I’m not very good in your world; You don’t like mine very much. Okay, go ahead, do your job. But stay out of our way and we’ll stay out of yours.’”

Billy Bob Thornton as Tommy Norris man of earth premiere

Emerson Miller/Paramount+

Wallace, co-creator man of earthdoes not believe there is necessarily an extension of his story yellowstonebut sees this as part of the Sheridan verse of storytelling. yellowstoneIt’s also TV’s number 1 series. currently airing season 5B on sundays, Announced to be the finale of the flagship series; still a Negotiations are ongoing for a possible sixth season And several by-products in production.

“I haven’t seen the last season ( yellowstone), but I think it works in his world,” Wallace said. TR about Landman. “I think it’s different from that story, but it’s also in line with (that universe). “In this world (Taylor) created, it makes sense.”

Certainly, man of earth He explained that it started with Wallace’s podcast and then took a few years to get production going.

“Taylor and her producing partners acquired the rights in late 2020,” Wallace said of the 2019 podcast. “Then Taylor and I talked about it for two years, talking about the story and the characters; two strikes and then a pandemic and all these other things. And here we are, five years later, having this conversation: man of earth.”

With Thornton and Hamm, Landman’s casting Andy Garcia and Michael Peña will also appear in guest roles in the film, which also stars Demi Moore, Ali Larter, Michelle Randolph and Jacob Lofland.

“The first domino in this whole thing, which Taylor knew from the very beginning, was that he wanted Billy Bob to be our main character, Tommy Norris,” Wallace said. “Everything cascaded from there. “The casting was fun, it was a pretty good cast.”

Thornton He told how Sheridan recently proposed to him the man of earth project following his cameo Saristone front part 1883. he said TR He said they had been in touch before and that they went to dinner afterward when he attended the premiere of the show and Sheridan told him, “‘I’m writing a show for you, I called you.” man of earth. ‘I’m going to write this in your voice and this is the world of the oil business and this is what a character is like.’ When I read the first script, I thought, ‘Boy, he wrote this in my voice, didn’t he?’ I said. (laughing)”

Although no talks have yet taken place beyond this season, Thornton says he sees no reason why the show wouldn’t have longevity.

“We were talking about this season at the beginning,” Thornton said. “But the idea of ​​going into this was that it was open-ended, that was the possibility. And I hope that’s the case. “We will see.”

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man of earth New episodes air on Paramount+ on Sundays.