Go Behind the Scenes of <i>Yellowstone</i> with Lainey Wilson (2024)

“I have always been a fan of Yellowstone, even from the first season,” says Lainey Wilson. “When I watch shows that have horses and depict that way of life, it makes me feel right at home because I grew up on a farm.”

So, when the hit series asked Wilson—a singer-songwriter who recently won the Country Music Association’s New Artist of the Year and Female Vocalist of the Year awards—to use her song “Working Overtime” in its second season, she was thrilled.

“As time went by, they put a few of my songs in the show, and then February of this year, [series creator Taylor Sheridan] texted me and he was like, ‘Lainey, I’ve got an idea,’” she says. “There was no telling what was about to happen, but he said, ‘I want to create a character specifically for you. I want you to pretty much be yourself, wear your bell bottoms, sing your own songs, but I want you to play a musician named Abby.’ And without thinking twice, I said, ‘count me in.’”

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Wilson’s Abby has appeared throughout the series’ fifth season, airing now—she's also had the opportunity to perform a number of original songs, including "Smell Like Smoke"—and joining the Yellowstone universe has been a thrill. “I've been in Nashville for 10 years,” she says, “and it feels like all the hard work is starting to pay off.”

Here, Wilson opens her camera roll to T&C to share a behind-the-scenes look at Yellowstone, and the moments that didn’t make it on screen.

"This was the second scene that my band and I did on the show, and I was just as excited for them as I was for myself. The reason I felt like we needed to capture this moment is because I used to impersonate Hannah Montana, that was my high school job and I would do three or four birthday parties a weekend. My very first Hannah Montana gig was on a flatbed trailer, and when people ask me what the most interesting stage is I've ever played on, I always talk about that flatbed trailer. When we pulled up for this scene, it was kind of just a full circle moment for us."

"Here I am with Ian Bohen, who plays my love interest, Ryan, in the show. I had never met him before that very first scene, and I didn't know what to expect. I wasn't sure how people were going to treat me, if they were going to be like, 'here's a dang singer-songwriter coming up in here like she's been acting.' But they didn't. They welcomed me with open arms. They were actually already fans of me and my music, and I was a fan of theirs too."

"Other than my name being different and me falling in love with certain people on the show, I will say I feel like I pretty much got to be myself. These costumes are the kind of things that I wear on a daily basis. I always wear my bell bottoms and feel like I'm wearing stage clothes and lots of jewelry. Johnetta Boone, the costume designer, crushed it. They made custom pieces for me and let me pretty much do what I do, but just kind of amplified it."

"Stephen Kay directed some of the episodes that I was in, and he's an incredible director but also just a great human. I didn't know if I was going to come in there and the director was going to be mean and say, 'that's not how you do it.' But he made me feel super comfortable. You can tell that he loves his job. He takes it very seriously, but he makes it a cool atmosphere."

"We had been back and forth to Montana pretty much all summer long—I've slept in my bed here in Nashville a total of probably 13 nights at this point. Whenever I'm on the road, or even when I was in Montana, I try to make sure that I find time to just go get grounded, get centered, and sometimes that means putting my feet in the grass or the sand."

"It was super cold that morning. It was probably about 7 a.m. and we were about to get started shooting. But when I was leaning up on the fence doing my scene with Beth, there was a group of cowboys out in the horse arena, kind of horsing around and roping each other. I was taking it all in. I was thinking, dang, that's not a bad view."

"I met Greg T. Moon [the makeup department head] on my first day before my first scene. It was probably 3:30 in the morning because we had to be on set super early that morning. It's crazy how differently they do the makeup when it comes to TV versus a music video or a photo shoot. They don't want it to be all glammed out, they want it to look kind of effortless. I think he did a really great job with that, and he also became a dear friend of mine. We sat there and talked about family and our lives and hardships, and it's really cool the relationships and the connections that you can make in a setting like that."

"This is my stunt double, Josie. Not that we were technically doing any stunts, but I was so busy on the road while we were filming that there were times where I needed to head out to the next place. There was one time when we left Montana at 5 p.m. and had to be in New York City getting ready for the Today show at 3 a.m., so there were times where they didn't get the shots that they needed from behind my head or in a crowd shot. That's when they used Josie. She's a good girl, a lot younger than me, but I've been calling her my twin. We really do look pretty dang similar."

"I was getting ready to do my first scene with [Kelly Reilly's character] Beth. I didn't know what to expect. I mean, her character on the show is such a badass that I thought she was going to put me in a headlock. But she didn't, she was so sweet. She said, 'had you not told me that this was your first acting gig, I would've thought you had been doing it your whole life.' That really gave me the courage to dive into it and give it my best shot."