Spoilers below for anyone who hasn't yet watched Yellowstone's most recent episode, so be warned!
Considering how rabble-rousing is viewed within the Yellowstone ranch's bunkhouse, one might think that John Dutton would have reacted a lot more harshly to performative protesters. But as it goes on neo-western, the people you'd least expect to be like-minded end up being the ones who make connections. (Unless it involves Beth, for which there are few examples of like-mindedness in the high country.) So perhaps it wasn't SO surprising to see Kevin Costner's ranch owner cozying up to Piper Perabo's activist Summer, especially considering he's clueless about everything happening with Jamie.
As seen in the video above, CinemaBlend spoke with Season 4's newest addition, Piper Perabo, about her character's introduction, and whether she's influencing John more, or the other way around. Here's how she answered:
I think that, you know, Summer comes to Montana looking for a fight. And she sort of picked the wrong family to mess with. If I could give her advice, I would tell her to pick another family. But what I like about Summer's relationship with John is that they both, in a kind of bigger-picture sense, have a common goal of this preservation of the land. And so it brings them together in a sort of unexpected alliance.
Understandably, Perabo left things dangling as far as what's yet to come between Summer and John — at least during this part of the interview — and teased them forming an "unexpected alliance." And by all means, it doesn't strain the imagination too hard to think about what could propel these two characters to put their goal-minded heads together, so long as Summer doesn't have goals of attacking the family.
Who better than a group of protesters to sic on Market Equities and all the construction happening on the land surrounding the Dutton property? I mean, I'm sure John himself wouldn't ever expect himself to succumb to the efforts of Summer's group — least of all someone like Caroline Warner — but if he's the one backing the efforts against someone else? I'd expect him to be overflowing with confidence in all things activism. So we'll have to wait and see if that's how things pan out later in the season.
Don't get me wrong, it's a mildly-to-wildly ridiculous to imagine a scenario playing out in real life where someone like John and someone like Summer can strike up a friendly conversation and take a drive together as trusting strangers. But I'll be damned if Kevin Costner doesn't make it work, with decades of chiseled charisma embedded in such a smooth performance. Given the actor's sageness on the screen, I had to ask Piper Perabo if everything he said in a scene felt like life advice in the moment, and she said:
It does! Because I mean, after seeing...you know, his body of work is so gigantic, and I've seen so so many of his films. But that sort of wears off pretty quickly, because what's incredible about him is that he is really a movie star. He really knows the camera, the scenes, the work. He's very confident in this kind of chill, steady way. So really quickly, you can fall into the work and doing the work, and it's really fun to work with people who are so talented. . . .
I can imagine that's how it would be for a lot of the actors on Yellowstone, even if Kevin Costner wasn't a legend specifically within the world of westerns. Though that's obviously going to play into it. If the ranch ever starts a baseball team, though, expect for lots of Bull Durham references to pop in. Taylor Sheridan seems more like a Bull guy than a Field of Dreams guy, amirite?
You can check out Kevin Costner talking about John's point of view during those moments in the behind-the-scenes video below.
As we wait with bated breath to see how Summer reacts to a potential scene with Kelly Reilly's Beth Dutton, remember that Yellowstone airs Sunday nights on Paramount Network, so be sure to tune in every week along with millions of other fans. And keep those eyes and ears out for the upcoming epic-in-scale prequel spinoff 1883, which will debut on Paramount+ and on linear TV on Sunday, December 19.
