Wes Bentley may have made it look easy onscreen, but playing Jamie Dutton took its toll. In an exclusive interview with Us Weekly , Bentley, 46, dished on the perks and pitfalls of stepping into the shoes of the complicated Yellowstone character. “It was really satisfying to play [someone with] no spine, weakness and emptiness,” he told Us while promoting part two of the series’ fifth season .
“It’s been a great challenge and one that I was really happy to try and meet — and I hope I did meet — but all that said, it is a weight that will be nice to let go of one day.” After growing accustomed to schedules required for short projects (“I’d go in, fully give it [my all] between ‘action’ and ‘cut’, and go home and [be] Wes and Dad, and cook and clean,” he explained) immersing himself in the role for an extended period proved to be difficult. “It infiltrated my life [for] over seven years and the depths of which I went with Jamie — and the amount of stuff that he has piled up in that baggage — it weighed heavy,” Bentley admitted.
“With this kind of character and for this long, it was harder and harder to let it go, even to the point where I didn’t even realize I wasn’t letting it go,” the American Horror Story alum continued. “There were aspects of Jamie now embedded in my behaviors. My kids saw it, my wife saw it [and] it was hard for them.
” “We all had to talk together, ‘like, okay, I think this is the show, guys,’ and thi.