2025 may go down in entertainment history as the year that broke the camel’s back, where in this case, the camel is Yellowstone-verse creator Taylor Sheridan’s longtime partnership with Paramount. It looks as if the high-profile writer/director/actor is angling to pack up and ship out once his highly lucrative current deal with the studio expires. What's more, he's already got NBCU in his crosshairs.
But when will that happen, and has Sheridan been planning for this eventual exit even while developing the trio of upcoming Yellowstone spinoffs? Let’s discuss.
Is Taylor Sheridan Actually Exiting Paramount, And When Would It Happen?
Nothing official has been announced from any of the parties involved, but many unofficial signs do point to "Yes" where this job changeover is concerned. According to Puck, Taylor Sheridan's team put the word out to David Ellison and other Paramount execs less than two weeks ago, and it sounds as if the alleged reasoning for the jump to NBCU is multi-fold, and doesn't just come down to one factor.
First, Sheridan has separate film and TV deals currently going at Paramount. His movie agreement wraps up in March, at which point he's allegedly already locked in for an eight-year movie deal for NBC Universal. The TV side of it is a little trickier, as that was for a longer contractual term, and it doesn't expire until 2028. (David Glasser's production company 101 Studios will also make the move to continue producing Sheridan's output.)
As far as why the creative is looking to change studios and platforms, the answer reportedly has little to do with money or anything financial. Rather, Sheridan has reportedly bumped against Paramount's newest regime of execs, which essentially replaced the squad of execs he'd worked with for the past five years, particularly Chris McCarthy and Keyes Hill-Edgar.
As well, Paramount's new streaming boss Cindy Holland has reportedly balked at some of the budgets given to the Hell or High Water screenwriter's shows, despite the company recently paying exorbitant sums for deals with South Park's co-creators, Stranger Things' co-creators and the UFC (to name but a few). Paramount+ has long touted Sheridan's various dramas as being top performers, which one might suspect would counterbalance the higher costs, but perhaps that's not the case.
A third alleged factor involves a script that Sheridan penned during the period before he signed on with Paramount, for a movie called F.A.S.T. Warner Bros. stepped up to secure the rights to it, and Parmount's head honcho David Ellison attempted to negotiate certain distribution rights for Paramount, which is said to have rankled the Yellowstone co-creator.
Beyond that, even, Cindy Holland tapped Lioness star Nicole Kidman for a new series, Discretion, but without giving a heads up to Taylor Sheridan that one of his stars would now have other responsibilities within the same studio, which possibly played into Lioness’ late-stage Season 3 renewal, which only happened a year or so after Season 2 concluded.
How Long Has Taylor Sheridan Been Planning His Exit Behind The Scenes?
While Sheridan's aim to flip studios reportedly only became official when his lawyers reached out, one has to wonder if the multi-hyphenate has quietly been setting himself up for an eventual big exit. That's obviously the kind of detail that'd be hard to ascertain without the creator himself pointing it out, but there are some clues to be gleaned.
Yellowstone earned Sheridan a reputation for working solo in the writers room, and it followed him from one project to the next as he built up his current array of Paramount+ dramas. And while he understandably had to share responsibilities on certain projects, he seemed determined to keep control over everything involving the Dutton family, thus serving as showrunner for both prequel spinoffs 1883 and 1923.
My own suspicions rose up after it became clear that Sheridan wasn't handling day-to-day duties on Rip and Beth’s spinoff, nor seemingly any of the other Yellowstone follow-ups. Check out this showrunner breakdown:
Current Showrunners For Taylor Sheridan-Created Series
- Lioness Season 3 - Taylor Sheridan
- Mayor of Kingstown Season 4 - Dave Erickson
- Landman Season 2 - Christian Wallace
- Tulsa King Season 3 - Dave Erickson (has since exited)
- Y: Marshals Season 1 - Spencer Hudnut
- Yellowstone's Rip & Beth Spinoff - Chad Feehan
- The Madison Season 1 - TBA
This certainly isn't meant to imply that Taylor Sheridan has free time to add additional showrunner duties to his daily plate. The dude is working hard on turning Texas into the new Hollywood, and while it seemed like those efforts would be dedicated entirely to Paramount+ projects, that no longer looks to be the case.
How long was the writing on the wall for Sheridan and Paramount's eventual split? It's unclear at this point, But if this BTS drama is anything like what went down with Kevin Costner, we'll almost definitely hear about it in the months to come. Mayor of Kingstown and Tulsa King are currently streaming new episodes every Sunday on Paramount+.
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