For four seasons now, Jefferson White has dutifully and winningly filled the boots of Yellowstone’s Jimmy Hurdstrum, and has amassed quite the fandom for playing one of the western drama’s most sympathetic characters. Jimmy has faced some hectic and one-of-a-kind situations over the years — with his hands-on introduction to stallion breeding as a standout highlight — and the actor was granted his own distinctive experience in the form of The Official Yellowstone Podcast. White made it perfectly clear to CinemaBlend that hosting the companion piece to Paramount Network’s ratings juggernaut proved itself to be as big of a gift as he hoped.
Having debuted its premiere episode on December 9, 2021 (with new episodes dropping on Thursdays), The Official Yellowstone Podcast features Jefferson White having intimate conversations with his fellow co-stars and other special guests. As opposed to focusing on up-to-the-minute plotlines, episodes are more freewheeling with the subject matter, which covers behind-the-scenes anecdotes, personal stories and more. In our interview, I asked Jefferson White if these conversations differed greatly from how the cast interacted during filming, and it’s safe to say that’s exceedingly true. Here’s how he answered:
Yeah, they keep us pretty busy on set. It's a really grueling schedule. It's very physically difficult, you know, the show is very physically difficult to make. So we don't often have time to kind of get into the weeds and dig into this. And also, everybody's process is different. Everybody has a personal process that works for them. On set, we're mostly focusing on getting through the day, on making the show as good as we can. So it's a rare gift to get to sit down outside of that environment, away from the process of making the show, and sort of dig into it.
Understandably, if Cole Hauser is gearing up for a scene in which Rip is responsible for furiously beating the shit out of somebody with a tire iron, or getting pissed off at Carter for one thing or another, it’s perhaps not ideal for mood-setting purposes for him to have jovial conversations about how another character’s arc is going just ahead of filming. There are definitely actors out there who are able to dip in and out of characters’ headspaces with ease, but it sounds like Yellowstone requires quite a bit of mental preparation from its cast members before they can deliver some of the best dialogue on TV.
And that’s assuming there’s even spare time to handle such prep, since Taylor Sheridan and his creative team are extremely quick and effective with the filming process on a scene-by-scene basis. There simply isn’t much time during production to sit back and reflect on everything that’s happening, which is why the podcast amounted to such a fun and engaging experience for Jefferson White.
Adding to the actor’s enjoyment factor is the fact that Yellowstone doesn’t give Jimmy the opportunity to interact with many of the show’s core characters, especially now that he’s down in Texas to help set up the 6666 spinoff. Thus, the podcast afforded him the relatively rare opportunity to have a lengthy discussion with co-stars like Kelly Reilly and Luke Grimes. White continued, saying:
I mean, I've been so excited. You know, Jimmy never really gets to spend any time on screen with Beth, which is probably lucky for Jimmy. Same for Jamie. Jimmy never really bumps into Jamie on screen. So talking to Kelly Reilly, talking to Wes Bentley, getting to talk to these actors who I've admired for years — whose work I've loved for years, but have never gotten to really sort of experience firsthand face to face — that was such a gift. I was so looking forward to that, and they literally lived up to it. As an actor, I've been learning about cowboying and rodeoing and ranching for years, but I've also been learning from these actors for years, and so it was a really precious opportunity to get to sit down and sort of deepen that learning.
Considering the wealth of talent on display within the world of Yellowstone, I absolutely understand why Jefferson White is so appreciative for the opportunity to talk to everyone in a more intimate setting where there aren’t tons of crew members noisily setting up shots. The Official Yellowstone Podcast was recorded entirely within the new state-of-the-art recording studio within the Wynn Las Vegas resort, which is where the recently debuted prequel series 1883 had its world premiere. It doesn’t get much swankier than that, and the Duttons would settle for nothing less.
Check out new episodes of The Official Yellowstone Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, or whatever your preferred method is. And be sure to tune into the remaining episodes of Yellowstone Season 4 on Paramount Network on Sunday nights at 8:00 p.m., with 1883 taking viewers into the 2022 TV premiere season.
