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If the past tells a story about the present, American Primeval suggests that surviving America’s inherent violence is an endurance sport. Netflix’s new six-part limited series from director Peter Berg (Painkiller, Friday Night Lights) delves into who came before the cowboys, the beginning of the end of the Indian Wars, and the benefits of filming on location even if it means suffering for one’s art. A lot.
Taylor Kitsch (Lone Survivor, The Terminal List) stars as Isaac, a lonely frontiersman who begrudgingly guides a vulnerable settler woman and her son across 1857 southern Utah to reach their final destination in the very wild West. To make it there, Isaac and Sara (GLOW’s Betty Gilpin) must fight, trade, and evade clashing pockets of civilization, including militiamen, bounty hunters, Paiute and renegade Shoshone tribes, and the Mormon army.
Viewers are warned early and often that civilization doesn’t mean civilized.
“I don’t know if I had dreamed of being in a Western before, but certainly a period piece,” Gilpin says. “I think when I dreamed about it, I was thinking more like Pride and Prejudice, not, you know, people’s throats being ripped out.”
A real-life tragedy provides the inciting event that connects American Primeval’s large cast. Some 150 white settlers were killed during the Mountain Meadows Massacre, which historians claim was instigated or outright ordered by Mormon leader Brigham Young, who was fighting Indigenous tribes and the American government for his flock’s piece of land. Kim Coates plays the elected prophet and army commander with an intensity that was obvious even in Coates’ audition tape, in which the Sons of Anarchy star dressed as Young and delivered a sermon while kneeling in a cornfield.
Coates was eager to play such a controversial historical figure. “Win or lose—and he refused to lose at that time—the Mormon religion survived because of Brigham Young and the tenacity and love for faith that his flock had at that time,” Coates says.
Tenacity was often asked of Berg’s flock as well, particularly from the lead actors, who had to endure a month of “cowboy camp” in the wintry mountains of Arizona. There, actors adjusted to cold, frequent night shoots, weapons training, and worked with horses, the most unpredictable scene partners of all.
Kitsch, who has collaborated with Berg on multiple projects, already enjoyed the outdoors as a recent Montana transplant. “There’s just an incredible energy when you’re out there and you’re in the middle of nowhere, and you can hear nothing,” he says. “I gravitated towards that.”
When asked what he feels when Berg approaches him with a new idea, Kitsch is quick to answer. “I have no choice,” he smiles. “There’s just a brotherhood that’s there. And a trust.”
There were no soundstages or motion-capture suits for CG additions; authenticity was paramount, especially when audiences have already seen it in frontier stories like Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight and Iñárritu’s The Revenant, which was also written by American Primeval screenwriter Mark L. Smith. Indigenous consultant Julie O’Keefe was on set, working closely with the cast to sensitively portray Indigenous language, customs, and the spiritual outlook of distinct tribes at a time of brutal upheaval.
Derek Hinkey, who is himself Paiute-Shoshone, plays Crow leader Red Feather, head of a renegade Shoshone tribe. Having grown up on a reservation and already a skilled horseman, the recent Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 actor had different challenges—and rewards—working on the series.
“I know my traditions, religion, culture,” Hinkey says. “I fell in love with the rawness, the realness, and the truth the show is going to speak.”
Beyond the gore of scalped men and arrow-riddled innocents, American Primeval aims to showcase a rawness of emotion motivating every character, whether it’s Young’s clear-eyed faith, Sarah’s resilience, or Isaac’s grief. In present-day America, times can feel dark, perhaps too dark for a show that portrays unflinching violence.
Peter Berg doesn’t see it that way.
“These very different human beings come together to help each other, to look out for each other, to love and care for each other and keep each other safe through some pretty treacherous terrain,” says Berg. “I think at the end of the day, American Primeval is a love story.”
American Primeval premieres January 9 on Netflix.
The post Netflix’s American Primeval Unpacks a Real Life Western Tragedy appeared first on Den of Geek.
