The Texas Monthly writer talks about working with Taylor Sheridan and Billy Bob Thornton.
West Texas journalist Christian Wallace came to writing with a diverse array of work experience to his credit, having toiled at such jobs as roughneck, ditch digger, electrician, record store clerk, and radio DJ before joining Texas Monthly as a fact-checker in March 2016.
The roughnecking proved to be especially valuable as preparation and education when, in 2020, Wallace wrote and hosted Boomtown, a documentary podcast series about the Permian Basin’s historic oil boom and subsequent bust. Boomtown generated more than 4.8 million downloads — and, arguably more important, attracted the attention of mega-producer Taylor Sheridan, who used the podcast as the basis for Landman, his smash-hit Paramount+ series starring Billy Bob Thornton as oil company crisis manager Tommy Norris.
Wallace, who’s credited as co-creator and executive producer for Landman, recently joined us in the C&I Studio to talk about the highly successful series. How successful? Consider: The premiere episode delivered 14.6 million multiplatform viewers in its first seven days across Paramount+ and linear preview. And Landman Week 2, Day 1 reached 2.4 million domestic households, up a whopping 60+ percent from Week 1, Day 1 (1.5 million households). Looks like Taylor Sheridan has struck oil again.
