Why This YELLOWSTONE Star Feels Weighed Down by His Dark Role

Published: November 20, 2024

Why This YELLOWSTONE Star Feels Weighed Down by His Dark Role

Movieguide® Contributor

Wes Bentley plays John Dutton’s murderous son, Jamie, in YELLOWSTONE, and it takes a mental toll on him.

“Prior to the release of the second installment of season 5, Bentley explained to Fox News Digital that playing Jamie Dutton for the last five years has proven to be a real ‘challenge’ for the actor,’ Fox News reported.

“I love challenges and, as an actor, I’ve had great challenges in my career, but I’ve never had one like this,” he admitted. “And every scene that Taylor [Sheridan] wrote was some cathartic, emotional, you know, challenge.”

“And I find it really rewarding to get to work on things that are difficult to achieve, and I hope I did it pretty good,” he said.

But he doesn’t “identify” with any of his character’s traits, which impacts him in “real life.”

He said, “That’s been the most rewarding and challenging because Jamie is a character I don’t really identify well with at all and have a hard time living with, you know, he’s got a lot of baggage, a lot of heavy things to carry the load with.”

In the show, Jamie receives psychological and physical abuse and gives it in return. He also takes the lives of a few people.

“He’s incredibly sad,” Bentley previously said of his character. “I’ve always dealt with my sadness with things like comedy or humor or drugs at one point, or trying to just ignore it and finding another way out of it. But you can’t do that when you’re trying to portray someone’s sadness. You have to let it be there. That’s been the hardest part of it all, and it’s weighed on my life a little bit.”

The actor admits that Jamie’s disturbing life crosses over to his, and it’s not something he welcomes. Bentley can usually leave his character’s problems on set, but Jamie proved too much for him.

“Jamie’s sadness permeates my life, even though I’m not sad. I’m very lucky to have a great family and be where I’m at in life, but he’s always there behind me, clawing at that, especially when I’m shooting,” the actor admitted.

“Jamie stays with me. I don’t always want him there! When I see people talking about Method acting, my experience is that I’m trying as hard as I can to shake him,” he told The Hollywood Reporter last year.

“It’s been tricky though, because of the length of time. Because of the dynamics. I don’t know what they are. I’m sort of on my own here. I don’t really know what’s going on. Life happens and it drifts a bit. But I have a feeling it’s so ingrained that once we start really gearing up, it will all just come flooding back, and be overwhelming again.”

Though portraying Jamie has been a challenge, Bentley’s co-workers value his skills on the set.

“It’s remarkable, his ability to make you mad at Jamie, make you hate him and have him break your heart at the same time,” director Stephen Kay said.