It’s starting to look—by effect, if not necessarily intent—that Taylor Sheridan’s Whole Thing has been an ongoing effort to make a TV show with every single major American actor over a certain age. This thought brought to you by a report that Samuel L. Jackson is reportedly eying a starring role in a spin-off of the Sheridan-produced Tulsa King. Per THR, Jackson would enter the Tulsaverse (King Cinematic Universe?) through traditional TV methods: A guest star role on the third season of the Sylvester Stallone-starring Paramount+ show, followed by his own spin-off.
And why not? Between Tulsa King and Yellowstone, Sheridan has filled his TV Rolodex with many of film’s biggest names, starting with Kevin Costner, and then branching out to include Stallone, Harrison Ford, Donald Sutherland, Dianne Wiest, Billy Bob Thornton, Sam Elliott, and many more. (And that’s just the stuff that’s already come out: The man continually churns out new shows with a machine-like pace that really belies his love of horses and the open range.) Jackson, specifically, would be signing on for NOLA King, set (obviously) in New Orleans. If we had to guess from Sheridan’s whole MO, he’ll be playing some kind of extremely tough older man with ties to crime who nevertheless lives by a personal code of honor that is, dare we say, in many ways a more robust system of conduct than any of the pathetic laws of the nation in which we live. But this is only speculation! He might also turn out to have a love interest 30 years his junior, too.
NOLA King is being written and showrun by Dave Erickson, who also currently handles showrunning duties on Sheridan’s Mayor Of Kingstown. If Jackson ends up signing on for the show—and Deadline has pretty much confirmed it at this point—it’d be a rare turn to TV for the actor; his previous, rare television roles include some mandatory Marvel duties, Peacock’s Fight Night, and his Apple TV+ series The Last Days Of Ptolemy Grey.
