American Primeval’s Peter Berg: Making Netflix’s Western Drama Was Like Completing an Ironman — 2025 FIRST LOOK (Exclusive)
Making Netflix’s gritty Western drama American Primeval wasn’t just a challenging shoot, says director and executive producer Peter Berg: It was an endurance sport.
Much of the series, which drops on Thursday, Jan. 9, was shot on Native American reservations in New Mexico, and “oftentimes we were two hours from anything that felt like civilization,” the EP tells TVLine. The series’ starkly beautiful (and brutal) look comes from verisimilitude: When the characters are fighting the elements, so were the show’s crew.
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“We would get snowed on and we’d have to stop shooting, lightning strikes close enough to stop, windstorms, dust storms,” he recalls. “Weather and mother nature were our biggest obstacles.”
First greenlit by Netflix in December 2022, the show serves as a reunion for Berg and his Friday Night Lights star Taylor Kitsch, who is part of American Primeval‘s cast alongside Betty Gilpin (GLOW), Shea Whigham (Perry Mason), Joe Tippett (Mare of Easttown), Saura Lightfoot-Leon (The Agency), Kyle Bradley Davis (Enlisted), Lucas Neff (The Handmaid’s Tale) and many more. The six-episode, hour-long series is described as a “dark and gritty retelling” of the exploration of the American West in the 19th century.
In addition to Kitsch and Gilpin, who respectively play characters named Isaac and Sara, American Primeval‘s cast includes Dane DeHaan, Shea Whigham, Joe Tippett, Jai Courtney, Kyle Bradley Davis, Lucas Neff, Derek Hinkey, Saura Lightfoot-Leon, Preston Mota and Shawnee Pourier. Mark L. Smith (The Revenant, 2024’s Twisters) penned the scripts, and he and Berg executive-produce with Eric Newman.
“This is America… 1857. Up is down, pain is everywhere, innocence and tranquility are losing the battle to hatred and fear,” reads the official synopsis. “Peace is the shrinking minority, and very few possess grace — even fewer know compassion. There is no safe haven in these brutal lands, and only one goal matters: survival.”
American Primeval: See First Photos
In the exclusive featurette above, which is part of TVLine’s month-long #2025FirstLook series, Berg, Kitsch, Gilpin and other members of American Primeval‘s cast and crew break down exactly what it took to create the highly detailed, historically accurate series — as well as how tough the endeavor sometimes was.
“On the last day, I felt sad, tears, emotion,” Berg continues, “as though I’d just run one of those Ironman [triathlons] with 150 of the hardest working crew members I’d ever worked with.”
Press PLAY on the video above to get immersed in American Primeval, then hit the comments: Are you planning to watch?
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