Beth Dutton is a tough-talking Montana cowgirl with a brain for business and love for her husband Rip Wheeler.
But she is played by British woman: Kelly Reilly, 47, whose biggest gig was in Sherlock Holmes opposite Robert Downey Jr several years ago.
Kelly has now told the BBC that her success ‘hasn’t happened overnight.’
The actress has already been in many big-budget productions like True Detective.
Asked how it feels to be an in-demand leading lady these days thanks to Yellowstone – which returned on Sunday – Kelly told the site: ‘Well, I’m 47 years old, it hasn’t happened overnight, you know. So it’s not like I’m getting whiplash.’
She added: ‘I have been a working actor for 30 years.
‘It’s not lost on me that there’s a unicorn of shows that have such success worldwide and a character that has had this amount of attention or appeal.
‘But I treat it at arm’s length. I don’t spend too much time thinking about it.’
Reilly then insisted that she is a normie at heart.
‘I have a very normal life. It’s very important to me that my life is normal. Nothing has changed, other than I’m really busy,’ she said.
‘I don’t get to sleep at home very often, which is annoying because I love home!’
She is also happily married to Kyle Baugher; they wed in 2012.
Kelly says she ‘didn’t do any press’ before Yellowstone began, because she wanted people to believe in her character.
Kelly shared: ‘People talk to me as if Beth is real. We all talk about Beth like she’s a real-life person.
‘I’m always going to be a bit of a let down when people meet me. I go into the local bakery and the lady is like, “I’d love to drink with you,”‘ she said.
‘I know what she means – she wants to drink with Beth. People want to feel part of that energy… someone so connected with their primal self.
‘And we’re so disconnected. We’re all on our phones, on social media. It is like it doesn’t happen if someone doesn’t take a picture of it. Beth is the opposite of that. She is just so alive.’