Taylor Sheridan

Sheridan Taylor Gibler Jr. (born May 21, 1970), known professionally as Taylor Sheridan, is an American writer, producer, director, and actor. He is best known as the co-creator of the television series Yellowstone and creator of its prequels 1883 and 1923 (2022).

Sheridan has written several films, including the screenplay for Sicario (2015), for which he was nominated for the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Original Screenplay. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Hell or High Water (2016), which was nominated for three other Oscars, including Best Picture. Sheridan also wrote and directed the 2017 neo-Western crime film Wind River and wrote the 2018 sequel to Sicario.

Sheridan got his start portraying Danny Boyd in Veronica Mars (2005–2007) as well as portraying David Hale in the FX television series Sons of Anarchy. He has since created several series for Paramount+, including the crime thriller Mayor of Kingstown, the crime drama Tulsa King (which he co-writes with Terence Winter), the espionage thriller Lioness and the drama Landman.

In 2021, Sheridan was inducted into the Texas Cowboy Hall of Fame. In 2024, Sheridan was inducted into the Texas Business Hall of Fame. He is an honorary graduate of Texas Christian University. He was also awarded an honorary doctorate by Texas State University.

Early life and education Sheridan was born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Several news articles have reported that he grew up on a ranch in Cranfills Gap, Texas, but he was raised in Fort Worth, Texas, the son of a cardiologist. When Sheridan was eight years old, his mother insisted on buying a ranch in Cranfills Gap so that her children would "learn firsthand about the peaceful feeling of freedom in nature".

Career Sheridan began his career in acting, appearing in small films and in recurring roles in television series like Veronica Mars, Walker, Texas Ranger and most notably, as David Hale in Sons of Anarchy. He made the transition into screenwriting after he turned 40. His first film as a screenwriter was Sicario, directed by Denis Villeneuve. It revolves around Kate Macer (Emily Blunt), an FBI agent who is enlisted to a government task force to bring down the leader of a powerful and brutal Mexican drug cartel. It also starred Josh Brolin and Benicio del Toro. The film received critical acclaim, with a 92% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and received a number of nominations, including a Writers Guild of America Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay for Sheridan.

Sheridan wrote Comancheria after Sicario. Comancheria sold first but was stuck in development for quite a few years, appearing on the Black List survey of most liked screenplays not yet produced in 2012. It was later retitled Hell or High Water and was released in August 2016, starring Jeff Bridges, Chris Pine and Ben Foster, and again received critical acclaim. For his screenplay, Sheridan received a large amount of awards attention, earning BAFTA, Golden Globe Award, and Academy Award nominations.

The low-budget horror film Vile is credited as Sheridan's first film, but he does not consider the film his directorial debut, stating in a 2017 Rotten Tomatoes interview:

His second feature as director, and third as screenwriter, Wind River, starring Jeremy Renner and Elizabeth Olsen, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2017. The film follows an FBI agent (Olsen) and a veteran game tracker (Renner) investigating a murder that occurred on a Native American reservation. The Weinstein Company had acquired the distribution rights during the 2016 Cannes Film Festival, but dropped the film prior to the Sundance premiere. However, the company later finalized its deal to distribute it. Wind River was widely released in the United States on August 18, 2017, following a brief limited release. Following Sicario and Hell or High Water, Wind River is the third installment of Sheridan's trilogy of "the modern-day American frontier".

On September 15, 2016, Deadline reported that Sheridan had been set by Sony Pictures and Escape Artists to script the American remake of the Matthias Schoenaerts drama-thriller film Disorder, a 2015 French film directed by Alice Winocour. Escape Artists' Todd Black, Jason Blumenthal, Steve Tisch and Tony Shaw were scheduled to produce the remake and David Beaubaire to oversee it for the studio. James Mangold was going to direct.

In 2017, Sheridan created the television series Yellowstone, starring Kevin Costner, which aired on Paramount Network for five seasons running beginning June 20, 2018. Spinoffs include 1883 and 1923 on Paramount+.

Sheridan wrote the sequel to Sicario, titled Sicario: Day of the Soldado, which was directed by Stefano Sollima and released in 2018. More recently, his overall deal with ViacomCBS was renewed.

In May 2019, it was announced Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema acquired distribution rights to the film Those Who Wish Me Dead with Sheridan as director. The film had a theatrical debut internationally in South Korea on May 5, 2021. In the United States, it was released on May 14, 2021.

Owing partly to the success of the Yellowstone franchise, Sheridan expanded with the subsequent TV productions Tulsa King starring Sylvester Stallone, which has been renewed through season 4, and Landman starring Billy Bob Thornton.

On June 23, 2025, Paulynne, Inc., which owns and controls all of famed broadcaster Paul Harvey's intellectual property, sued Paramount Global in New York federal court. The company sued Paramount for using a 90 second audio clip from The Rest of the Story in Landman without permission. Paramount used a segment about rising gas prices from Harvey's 2009 "Gas Crisis" episode in the opening of the Season 1 finale. The lawsuit accused Paramount of failing to obtain permission to use the clip as well as editing the clip to change Harvey's viewpoint with regard to government fossil-fuel policies and his interest in alternative fuels.

On June 5, 2025, it was announced that NOLA King, a spin-off series of Tulsa King, was in the works at Paramount+. The series will be set in New Orleans and will star Samuel L. Jackson in a similar role as the one Stallone plays in Tulsa King. Jackson appeared in the third season of Tulsa King.

On February 24, 2026, it was reported by The Hollywood Reporter that Paramount+ had announced that the spinoff was moving away from New Orleans in favor of Texas and the name of the show changed to Frisco King instead of NOLA King. In addition, it was announced that Sheridan had been tapped to write all eight episodes of the first season.

On October 28, 2025, it was reported that Sheridan had signed a five-year overall deal with NBCUniversal, which will take effect after his current deals with Paramount expire in March 2026 for film, and 2028 for television. The deal was described as being a "coup" for the company, coming shortly after Skydance Media completed its acquisition of Paramount; CEO David Ellison had previously praised Sheridan as being a "singular genius", and had hoped that he would "call Paramount his home for as long as he wants to be telling stories."

On June 23, 2026, Sheridan co-wrote a book with former convict Tom Nelson entitled How to Not Die in Prison.

Style As an actor, Sheridan explained that the amount of expositional dialogue he read for television caused him to form an "allergy to exposition" in his writing. He has also said that he looks for "absurdly simple" plots to focus solely on character. He has cited the Coen brothers, Cormac McCarthy, and Larry McMurtry as influential to his writing.

Sheridan's popular TV shows such as Landman (TV series) have widely been described as "conservative", "red-state entertainment" and "Make America Great Again propaganda" . Sheridan has publicly contested these characterizations of his style noting in an interview with the The Atlantic "I just sit back laughing. I’m like, ‘Really?" . Critics note a more complex blend of some progressive and traditional conservative themes in his shows .

Personal life Sheridan has been married to actress and model Nicole Muirbrook since 2013. The pair have a son. They currently reside in Weatherford, Texas. In 2025, Sheridan bought Cattlemen's Steak House in Fort Worth, Texas, with two business partners.

Filmography +Key Denotes works that have not yet been released Film Year Title Director Writer Producer 2011 Vile 2015 Sicario 2016 Hell or High Water 2017 Wind River 2018 Sicario: Day of the Soldado 2021 Without Remorse Those Who Wish Me Dead 2023 Finestkind 2027 F.A.S.T.

Television Year Title Creator Director Writer Executive producer 2018–2024 Yellowstone 2019–present The Last Cowboy 2021–2022 1883 2021–present Mayor of Kingstown 2022–2025 1923 2022–present Tulsa King 2023 Lawmen: Bass Reeves 2023–present Lioness 2024–present Landman 2025 The Road 2026–present Marshals The Madison Dutton Ranch TBA Frisco King

Acting roles Film Year Title Role