Billy Bob Thornton: “Everybody on the crew was going to pass out” While Working in Taylor Sheridan’s Landman

Sometimes shooting a television show can be quite challenging, even when everyone on the set is highly experienced. Working on a script is not only about memorization and performance, but it sometimes gets to the point where the cast and crew are pushed to their physical limits.

Taylor Sheridan’s Landman is a perfect example of a show that provides its team with such challenges. Among the main cast of the show, Billy Bob Thornton recently revealed how the show is as much about survival as it is about storytelling.

The Extreme Conditions of Filming Landman

Set in West Texas oil fields, Landman revolves around the oil workers, billionaires, and everything that happens behind the business. Taylor Sheridan has tried to present his vision of passion, power, survival, and regional economic dynamics through the show.

Landman focuses on an oil firm with its main character, Tommy Norris, portrayed by Billy Bob Thornton. The series indeed boasts an impressive star cast that includes Ali Larter, Jon Hamm, and Demi Moore, among others.

However, the subject of the show and the script have posed a lot of difficulty to the Landman team. In an interview with Vanity Fair, Thornton revealed the conditions they had to face while filming.

There were days when I thought, not only me, but everybody on the crew was going to pass out. It was so hot some days, and we’re shooting out at these oil pumpjacks. Do you know what caliche is? We’re on these caliche roads with the rocks in ‘em and stuff, and I’m wearing cowboy boots, and there are scenes where I have to run to the truck. It’s a hundred degrees with a hundred percent humidity.

Thornton, who is in his 60s, admitted how difficult it was to shoot, admitting, “This was probably the hardest thing I ever did.”

Another cast member, Kayla Wallace, added to the sentiments of Thornton. In the Vanity Fair interview, she mentioned one of their most challenging days where “everyone was getting chigger-bit”. She added,

Our medic was doing his absolute best to keep everyone hydrated, but it’s hard. We had a Black Hawk helicopter flying above us and we were blowing up mortars. I had found a cow skull on the ground and a prop guy looked at me. He was carrying a fake kilo of cocaine, and he goes, ‘Man, I’d be damned if we weren’t in Vietnam right now.’

Nevertheless, everyone in the cast managed to focus on realizing Sheridan’s vision in such difficult circumstances. The series stayed true to portraying the world of the oil industry, and everyone invested their best effort into portraying the gritty reality.

Taylor Sheridan’s Personal Touch for Billy Bob Thornton in Landman

Landman originated through the personal connection between Thornton and Sheridan in a way. The two previously worked on 1883 and developed a professional bond. In an interview with Los Angeles Times, Thornton revealed that Sheridan told him, “I’m writing a series for you called ‘Landman,’ and I’m going to write it in your voice.”

Thornton was interested from the start in the role of Tommy Norris, perhaps because he himself grew up in Arkansas and Texas. His character is a fixer and foreman who works closely with both high-level executives and field workers. “I like to do parts that I’m right for,” Thornton said in the interview.

Thornton described the challenges of his role by saying, 

There aren’t really a lot of scenes where my character comes home and says, ‘My God, was my day amazing!’ I slink into the house every day like somebody just beat the hell out of me.

Sheridan and Thornton’s partnership yielded a very realistic character. Thornton enjoyed the fact that he had the chance to play a deep character in a familiar environment, which helped him to understand Tommy Norris’ complex professional and personal life.

Landman is now streaming on Paramount+.