Coyote Joins Paramount Network’s Growing Scripted Slate Featuring Epic Series Yellowstone, 68 Whiskey, Emily in Paris and Paradise Lost
Paramount Network today ordered a 10-episode first season of one-hour scripted drama Coyote from Sony Pictures Television. Emmy Award-winning executive producer Michelle MacLaren (Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad), will direct the pilot and executive produce the series. Emmy Award-winning Michael Chiklis is attached to star and executive produce the series. Coyote, which is scheduled to debut in 2020, comes to Paramount Network from MacLaren Entertainment, Dark Horse Entertainment and Sony Pictures Television.
David Graziano (American Gods, Southland) will serve as showrunner. Graziano, Michael Carnes and Josh Gilbert (Mr. Woodcock) are attached to write and executive produce Coyote. Dark Horse Entertainment’s Mike Richardson and Keith Goldberg (The Umbrella Academy) are executive producers. Rebecca Hobbs of MacLaren Entertainment is an executive producer.
Coyote is the story of Ben Clemens (Chiklis), who after 32 years as a border patrol agent, is forced to work for the very people he spent his career trying to keep out of America. Now exposed to life on the other side of the wall, Ben will start to question his black and white views of the world, challenging his ideology and his loyalties.
“David Graziano, our whole creative team, and I are excited to make a show with Paramount Network and Sony that will dramatize a conversation between Mexico and America,” said MacLaren. “I have wanted to work with Michael Chiklis for a long time and am thrilled he is playing such a complex character whose journey will expose multiple points of view on this relevant and complicated issue.”
“We’re honored to work with Michelle MacLaren, Michael Chiklis, David Graziano and the rest of the gifted creative team on Coyote,” said Keith Cox, President of Development, Paramount Network and TV Land. “The powerful, timely setting and complex characters are a perfect fit with the rest of our growing scripted slate. Coyote is befitting of the strong Paramount name.”
“We are incredibly excited to be working with this creative powerhouse of a team and beyond thrilled to have Michael Chiklis back in our SONY family,” said Jason Clodfelter, Co-President of Sony Pictures Television.
“While most of our shows and movies come from our own library, in Coyote, we found an original idea and character that were undeniable and attracted this incredible creative team,” said Mike Richardson, Dark Horse Entertainment’s President and Founder. “We are genuine fans of Michael Chiklis and Michelle MacLaren, and we couldn’t be more excited about this show.”
The series order comes on the heels of the recently announced 10-episode greenlights for Paradise Lost (working title), from Rodes Fishburne, Arika Lisanne Mittman and John Lee Hancock, and 68 Whiskey, from Ron Howard and Brian Grazer’s Imagine Entertainment, as well as the new Darren Star series, Emily in Paris starring Lily Collins. Paramount Network’s scripted roster is headlined by Yellowstone, which returns for its second season on June 19 and was 2018’s most-watched new cable series, ranking second across all of cable TV series for the year (5.1 million total viewers per episode).
Keith Cox and Lauren Ruggiero, Vice President of Development for Paramount Network, will oversee Coyote for the network.