David Becker/Getty Images
Audio By Carbonatix
After the success of Yellowstone, Landman and 1923, Texas-based writer-director Taylor Sheridan returns with The Madison, led by Hollywood legends Michelle Pfeiffer and Kurt Russell.
Partly filmed in Dallas and Fort Worth, The Madison follows the Clyburn family from New York to the Madison River Valley of Montana as they confront unexpected grief following a tragic accident and adjust to a new way of life.
Just like Yellowstone, The Madison is set in southwestern Montana and grapples with themes such as strong family dynamics and the natural struggles of a rural setting. However, actor Matthew Fox believes the show brings something new and fresh to the Sheridan-verse with a “quiet and intimate human interaction.”
“When I read the scripts, I was really blown away by them,” Fox says. “I am a fan of Taylor, and I think his writing is fantastic. To me, this just had a certain poetry to it. It was creating imagery of this place in my mind before I had even seen where it would take place. It was beautiful and lyrical.”
Amiah Miller adds, “The Madison expands Taylor’s universe in an emotional way. It is a truly beautiful show about connection and family and the importance of it. It’s deeply human and profound. It will remind audiences how precious life is and how much we take it for granted.”
Sheridan Brings It Home
Despite the majority of the series being filmed in Montana, Sheridan shot some scenes close to home, which has become his modus operandi as he positions Texas as the next Hollywood replacement. Used to fill in for the Manhattan scenes, Main and Ervay Streets were given a NYC makeover with yellow taxis and New York Police Department vehicles.
“It’s amazing when you get a production that’s as good as this with as much talent, how quickly you can transform a street by putting lots of traffic and people on it,” actor Patrick J. Adams says about the Big Apple-ification of Texas. “We would go out on the streets and be like, ‘We’re in New York.’ It’s amazing how they accomplished this.”
In contrast to the bustling metropolis of the DIY New York, Montana’s rural setting plays a starring role in the series. But oscillating between the raw Montana terrain and Sheridan’s home base made filming “unpredictable,” says cast member Beau Garrett.
“You have to lean into the weather,” she says. “There were days we had to pivot and days that weather would come up, and all of a sudden we were pulling a scene from next week to that day. … I personally prepared a week in advance because I never knew if something was going to be thrown my way. I also wanted to be very clear about where we were going in the story because there are things that we shot in Montana, and then we’d have to move to Texas, so I had to be technical about where you are emotionally and where you’re going.”
Branching Out
The show marks a pivot for Sheridan, who has been criticized for one-dimensional female characters in his prior works. But The Madison, according to star Kurt Russell, says the new show is “female-gaze oriented,” under the guidance of lead Michelle Pfeiffer.
Adams corroborated the show’s departure from Sheridan’s usual brawny male archetypes, describing his character, Russel McIntosh, as “the least Taylor Sheridan character” to date.
“I had not seen him write a man who had no idea what to do but was trying to do it anyway,” he says. “I hadn’t seen this before, and as an actor, this was a goldmine.”
All six episodes of the first season of The Madison are available to stream exclusively on Paramount+. The second season has completed filming, but a release date has not been announced.
