Yellowstone Season 5 Part 2 director Christina Voros has revealed the extreme lengths used to protect what might be Taylor Sheridan’s biggest ending yet.
With Yellowstone Season 5 Part 2 supposedly being the grand finale of Sheridan’s Western drama, the stakes are high. There are only six episodes left to wrap up a multitude of questions, not the least of which being how the show will handle Kevin Costner’s exit.
According to Christina Voros, who directed four out of the six remaining episodes, the cast and crew resorted to extreme lengths to protect the final Yellowstone scripts.
“We have some people in the crew who worked in the Marvel universe, and they thought what we were doing was crazy,” she told The Hollywood Reporter.
Explaining how much it meant to those behind the scenes to keep Taylor Sheridan’s flagship story under wraps, Voros detailed the precautions taken. This included removing sections of the script from various Yellowstone cast members.
“We didn’t have a script coordinator; I took over that role and did the redactions for every cast member,” she explained. “Most of the cast only got the scenes they were in. So for a large portion of the cast, even for some of our seven-year veterans, they will be learning what happens when the show premieres.”
As Voros described it, this technique was used to “protect” the cast and crew from having to know information they would then have to keep secret. This also meant other creative departments, who would normally be given access to all scripts, were limited to information they only needed to know.
A select few people, including Voros and her first assistant director, were granted access to the scripts in their entirety (outside of Sheridan himself). Later, department heads, director Michael Friedman, and most of the main cast were then allowed to see the full picture.
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“The cast of the Duttons themselves are in the secret club,” Voros said. “But for the most part, people knew the scenes they were in. So if they were in scenes where something happened that needed to be protected, they knew about it. But if they weren’t, about half the cast doesn’t know what happens this season, outside of their own work.”
Part of the precautions also included the use of “code words” being implemented on set and shooting different versions of a scene. By doing this, the crew ensured that the background cast of up to 150 people at times weren’t able to share exact details of what the scene would entail.
On top of this, they also used closed sets to shoot certain moments, taking on a “cloak and dagger” approach.
It’s a level of security the set of Yellowstone had never experienced before. But according to Voros, a “perfect storm” of events meant it was necessary, including the highly published exit of star Kevin Costner.
“There was so much in the press about Kevin,” she said. “And when you make a show that has such a beloved following, everyone is going to have their ideas about how it should end.”
Yellowstone returns on November 10 on the Paramount Network. For more, check out our guide to who’s most likely to die in Part 2. You can also keep up with the news on 6666, The Madison, and Yellowstone 1944 to see what’s ahead.