Helen Mirren is one of the latest actors to join the Taylor Sheridan universe for the Yellowstone prequel 1923. Mirren portrays Clara Dutton, a distant relative of Kelly Reilly’s Yellowstone character Beth. Although Mirren and Reilly won’t be working together on the same Sheridan-verse show, they did film a TV series together at the very beginning of Reilly’s acting career.
Helen Mirren and Kelly Reilly worked together on the set of ‘Prime Suspects’
Kelly Reilly is a British actor with decades of experience. One of her earliest roles was a two-episode stint as Polly Henry in season 4 of the drama series Prime Suspects. Reilly, now 45, was only a teenager at the time. Mirren also appeared in Prime Suspects as DCI Jane Tennison, and Reilly was a bit starstruck.
“Helen Mirren is someone who I did my very, very first TV job with called Prime Suspect when I was 16 years old,” Reilly said told Entertainment Tonight at the Paramount 2022 upfronts. “She was the first professional actor I worked with. She was incredible, she was fierce and brilliant and everything I wanted to be as an actor. You know, full of courage and heart.”
Mirren called Reilly a ‘star’ when they worked together decades ago
Years later, Reilly joined the cast of Yellowstone as Beth Dutton, John’s fiery and loyal only daughter. Helen Mirren will also be a part of the Sheridan-verse in the Yellowstone prequel 1923. Mirren plays Clara Dutton, the matriarch of the Dutton family and a distant relative of Beth Dutton.
In a recent interview with Entertainment Tonight, Mirren remembered back to her first time working with Reilly on Prime Suspects. “I remember this very beautiful and very talented girl arriving on the set, and I remember looking at her and saying, ‘There’s a star,’” she told the outlet. “And it was her first job. It was very clear right from the beginning.”
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“I’ve watched Kelly over the years just giving wonderful performances in the theater and on screen, and it’s just another one of her great performances,” Mirren said of Reilly’s work as Beth in Yellowstone. Unfortunately, Reilly and Mirren won’t be having any scenes together in the Sheridan-verse since their characters live decades apart.
Helen Mirren enters the Sheridan-verse as Cara Dutton in ‘1923’
In 1923, Helen Mirren portrays Cara Dutton, an Irish immigrant, and Jacob Dutton’s wife. Although the series is set nearly a century ago, Mirren told Deadline she sees her character as an “equal partner” to Jacob.
“We’re presenting a couple who [in a] relationship [that] when it’s gone that long becomes a partnership,” she said. “And so, they are partners as much as anything, of course, they’re husband and wife, but their real kind of equal partners in which you would have to be dealing with that kind of environment.”
1923 premieres Sunday, December 18, 2022, on Paramount+.
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