Who Is Taylor Sheridan?
Taylor Sheridan grew up in Cranfills Gap, Texas, partly on his family's ranch, and spent two decades as a working actor before he wrote anything anyone produced. Most viewers know that face from Sons of Anarchy, where he played Deputy Chief David Hale for three seasons.
He walked away from acting in his early forties over a pay dispute, and started writing on the theory that he had nothing left to lose. The first script that sold was Sicario. The second was Hell or High Water, which earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay. The third was Wind River, which he directed himself.
Then came Yellowstone, rejected by several buyers before Paramount Network took it, and slowly built into the most-watched drama on American television. What followed was a production empire: prequels, spinoffs, an oil drama, a mob comedy-thriller, a CIA series, and a working cattle operation in Texas that doubles as a location and a business.
He writes about one thing in a dozen registers — who holds the land, what the family did to keep it, and which institution shows up too late to help. That is as true of a Permian Basin oil lease as it is of a Montana ranch.
In late 2025 he agreed to leave Paramount, his home for a decade, for NBCUniversal in a deal reported at more than $1 billion — film work first, with the television side beginning after his Paramount commitments run through 2028. The Yellowstone universe stays at Paramount; what he builds next will not.
