Yellowstone fans are well-versed in Kevin Costner’s controversial departure from the hit show, but it turns out it could have happened much sooner!
By now, the exit of Kevin Costner from Yellowstone has become almost legendary. As soon as the show hit the airwaves in 2018, it was a smash hit, mostly thanks to Kevin Costner’s star power as John Dutton. That seemed likely to continue for a long while.
That ended in 2023 when Costner left the show after a very public war with creator Taylor Sheridan over pay and other problems. He stayed through season 4, but season 5 opened with John being killed off-screen before the show ended with the new spinoffs Marshals and Dutton Ranch, now airing.
Speaking to The Bill Simmons Podcast, Sheridan shared the startling revelation that if things had gone to plan, Costner would have left earlier in the series’ run and under better circumstances.
"Kevin was only supposed to be in the first three seasons. That was in his contract. In my mind, that's when his youngest son takes over, and then we have to watch [them] lose that ranch, or not lose the ranch, whatever the case is going to be."
This may sound wild, yet it would oddly make sense. Costner was a major star, perhaps too much for a TV series. Having him star to get audiences hooked on the show and then stepping aside for it to continue could have been a good move to keep the series flowing along and have more seasons.
According to Sheridan, Costner was set to go at the end of season 3, “but the network was so scared of not having Kevin be a part of it. He had other things he wanted to do, but he stayed on for another two seasons, and that was just because the show was such a behemoth. It was such a huge hit that the notion of giving up a hit before it had run out of juice to squeeze is very foreign to a network."
"Finally, Kevin hit a point where he's like, 'I gotta do my own thing,'" Sheridan explained. "We had originally conceived it together that it was three seasons, and then the baton is handed. I thought it wouldn't have been better for the show because we had tried to tread water for a bit there. I think it was pretty evident."
Costner would go on to helm his long-planned $100 million Western dream project, Horizon: An American Saga, which he planned as a four-film series. Instead, the first film was a box office bomb, with the second sent straight to streaming.
Sheridan’s words seem rather cordial, yet they also sound like a lot of spin control. It contradicts numerous reports of Costner clashing with co-star Wes Bentley, among others, as well as fights with Sheridan. Costner claimed in interviews that he was offered less money for fewer episodes in season 5, while other reports claimed his list of demands included not only a huge pay increase but full creative control, which, of course, Sheridan refused to give him.
We may never know the full truth, yet it’s interesting to consider how Costner leaving the show much earlier would have made Yellowstone a far different series.
Yellowstone is now streaming on Peacock.
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