Latasha M. Ford with Awards Buzz goes behind-the-scenes for an exclusive interview with ‘The Madison’ star Ben Schnetzer. In this deep dive, Ben Schnetzer talks about the physical demands of playing Van Davis and explores Taylor Sheridan’s genius writing.
This interview provides a rare, detailed look at Schnetzer’s immersive process, including: The Cast Experience where Ben recounts the “surreal” moment he was cast by Taylor Sheridan nearly two years after a previous unsuccessful audition, affirming his philosophy to show up to “do a job, not get a job”. Mastering the Craft! The star who plays Van Davis elaborates on his extensive dialect work, which involved working with coach Liz Himmelstein and listening to regional NPR and IndieWire interviews on repeat to find Van’s specific Western accent. Cowboy Bootcamp with Ben sharing his journey of “cowboy bootcamp,” where he mastered horseback riding and discovered a genuine, meditative passion for fly fishing. Ben’s character’s Functional Physique where he explains why he avoided a “gym rat” look, instead training for a utilitarian, athlete-style body that reflected a policeman’s lifestyle in the Madison River valley. And Taylor Sheridan’s Poetic, Writing Rhythm — Ben describes Sheridan’s scripts as “cowboy poetry,” praising the “muscularity and stripped-back musicality” of writing that says a lot in very few words.
Full interview below:
Latasha: Ben, we’re here to talk about The Madison and about Van Davis. I want to thank you for your time today in advance. Thanks for making time to speak with me. Let me start by saying congratulations on season three.
Ben: Thank you. Thank you so much. I know we’re thrilled. It’s totally surreal and I’m very excited. It’s really been a gift to be a part of this project. I think hearing that we’re coming back to do it again as early as we have, it’s just been like such wind in our sails, such a lift. I can’t wait to get back to work.
Latasha: This is somewhat of a full circle moment for you working alongside Taylor Sheridan because at some point in the past you auditioned for a role and at the time you did not land the role. However, Taylor kept you on his radar and circled back around to you nearly two years later for this opportunity. How does that make you feel?
Ben: That’s right. It feels amazing! There’s the practicality, the actuality of how fortunate and lucky I feel and how grateful I am–the good fortune of it all. In this business as actors we hear the word NO a lot and part of the process is you go and you have to sing for your supper and you audition. When I was first coming up, it was everyone in the room doing the thing and meeting the people and having to really kind of go through that whole racket. This, I think was affirmation of something that I had told myself a lot, a famous quote “When you show up to an audition, you show up to do a job, not get a job.” That is important and useful for actors to approach auditioning in that way. You’re not trying to make anyone like you. You are pretentious, though it may sound like you’re an artist, you’re a craftsperson, you do your job and show up. If someone wants to hire a caterer for their wedding and your specialty is Italian food, cook a really good Italian meal. Just go to do your thing. It’s affirmation that you never know how things are going to work. If you just kind of show up and do your work and work hard and try and put your best foot forward, you never know how it’s going to pay off down the road.
Latasha: And it definitely paid off for you clearly! I want to talk about this Western accent. You have a very beautiful natural accent, but I want to talk about the learning curve there with mastering the Western vibes. Were you working with dialect/vocal coaches? How long did it take for you to master that accent? It’s just something that stood out so much to me.
Ben: I truly appreciate that question. It’s an interesting one. I’ve always loved doing accent work and dialect work, and I’ve been lucky enough to be able to do a fair bit of it. And it’s always a real kind of touchstone for me with characters and it’s always a very fun place for me to start because obviously the process begins with reading words on a page and then starting to speak them out loud and trying to find the music of it all. And Taylor writes in a very particular rhythm. You kind of just have to surrender to it because you can’t impose anything on it. You got to let it lead you a little bit.
So a lot of the character’s voice was in the writing. It’s funny for me. I see a cowboy hat and automatically go into a Texas accent and I immediately had to check myself and say, “Wait a second, we’re a really long way from Texas.” So I really just started zoning in on that part of the country and listening to as many voices as I could. And I found a couple anchors, a few examples that were really, really helpful for me that kind of guided me. And then I did work with a wonderful dialect coach, Linton named Liz Himmelstein, who I did a few sessions with and she just gave me a really helpful framework to kind of, “This is your warmup, these are your sounds, now go have fun.”
Latasha: I’m curious as to how much of it is speaking out loud and practicing in the mirror versus listening to other characters or individual voices is involved in the learning approach [mastering the character’s accent for the role]?
Ben: Really interesting question and such a good question. It’s less like practicing in the mirror and less kind of … I think if I get too prescriptive with stuff or if I get two actors who are so neurotic and it’s so easy for us to get self-conscious, anything I can do to get out of my head, I really want to do. So for me, just to use this as an example, there’s an actor who, he’s not from Montana, he’s from South Dakota, but he’s from that part of the world. He grew up cowboying and he’s someone who I was a really helpful touchstone for me for Van’s voice. There were two interviews with him that I found, one on NPR and one on Indiewire. I would just listen to these interviews non-stop. I’d go for a run and just listen to it on repeat. So it’s actually a lot of listening to people talk and a lot of anchor words that you kind of have to say or a sentence that you say that kind of gets you into the accent.
Latasha: Riddle me this, Ben, because obviously I want to know about your overall preparation for this role. Obviously, you went from being in the busy city of New York to beautiful, peaceful mountains in Montana. I get that you’ve taken on the cowboy thrill of everything, flyfishing, horseback riding, the list goes on. But before you get into how you personally locked into your character, I want to know, do you prefer the scenes where you’re in the water, like in the river or the dust and the dirt from being this cowboy?
Ben: That is such a compelling question. The scenes on the river always surprise me. They always really surprise me because the river, it’s a surprising entity and there are times when we’re filming and I’m like on my way to set, and you’re being told, “You’re going to have this big rushing body of water next to you so you have to just be aware and blah, blah, blah.” And you show up to set and it’s peaceful, it’s calm, and it’s still [the water].
And then there are days where that’s what I’m expecting and you show up and there’s one scene between myself and Michelle-episode four … Michelle’s doing some really heavy lifting in the scene and it’s quite a loaded scene between the two of us. I remember on the page, I read it as a very delicate intimate scene. The scene was supposed to be very raw and very intimate, especially with what we’re saying to each other. I remember showing up on set and was like, “Oh, she’s standing in the river. She’s like 50 feet away from me.” I basically have to yell my lines to her.
But then you realize, you just have to open yourself up and say to yourself “We’re here now let’s take a seat and get started.” You just kind of surrender to it. I think just listening to myself, I think the answer I’m giving you is there’s something about the water that really calls me in this part of the world. So, I love the scenes in the river.
Latasha: What did the journey look like for you mastering some of these things you’ve learned such as fly fishing, horseback riding, etc? Are any of those things genuine hobbies of yours now?
Ben: It’s interesting when we started filming, I think we had about three scripts written, the first three scripts we started filming and then the subsequent kind of the final three filtered in as we were working. And I remember the Wranglers, like the Cowboys on the show took Kevin Zegers and I, Kevin who plays Cade took us aside and they were like, “Look, Taylor, he doesn’t know if you’re going to do a bunch of cowboying this season, but he wants you to be ready to.” So if he wants to write it, he can. And so I don’t think I end up on horseback in season one, but we sure got to do a lot of riding later on. They really put us through the kind of cowboy bootcamp and maybe not as intensively as they do on some of the kind of proper cowboying shows, but we really had wonderful access to this team who are the best in the business.
Both Kevin and I, well just anybody who spends time with horses knows that it’s a profoundly enriching, calming, and meaningful experience. I think we both really fell in love with it. And as actors, it’s hard not to lean into. I would leave the house and my wife’s like, “You’re going to wear your cowboy boots again.” I found that to be really enriching. I also had no idea that I was going to fall in love with fly fishing the way I did, I really enjoy fly fishing. I’m not very good at it, but I think the whole point is the kind process and the experience is just incredibly meditative. And I actually having spent so much time on the river at this point now going back when I watched season one for the first time, I was really deeply moved by all of the scenes between Matthew and Kurt when they’re on the river and having a little bit of experience, having done it, knowing what it means to people, knowing what it means to those characters and also knowing that both Matthew and Kurt, are really accomplished fishermen in their own right. I just thought they did such a beautiful job tracking the arc and tracking the narrative of those two brothers. It was so beautiful.
Latasha: So let me say this, sometimes I could be known as the journalist and the red carpet correspondent that may ask somewhat of an inappropriate question. I don’t feel like this is going to be an inappropriate question. So just stay with me for a minute. You seem to and have always seemed to already be a man that is truly in good shape aesthetic wise. So now taking on some of these new things that you have learned, I’m sure you have experienced a huge shift with your body type, the way your body is cut-muscle-wise, etc… that’s my assumption but would you agree? Also, I’m sure you’ve likely had to shift or change your diet and eating habits as well to make sure you’re able to get out there and fly fish, horseback ride, row a boat for eight, 10, 12 hours. Can you speak to that?
Ben: Wow! No one has ever asked me that question and it’s such a brilliant, out of the box question and the answer is yes. There are a couple beats in the script where there’s a couple comments about Van being someone who’s in pretty good shape. There’s a certain standard that I have to meet. So there’s obviously the kind of awareness of that and the work that goes into that. I mean, one of the things that I found really kind of freeing is once you show up and once you’re there. There’s a really natural flow to when you’re spending time with cowboys and you’re spending time with outfitters on the river and nobody’s talking about … They’re not going to the gym. They’re not doing keto. You eat when you’re hungry and you usually eat just real food, but your exercise is just your lifestyle and it’s what you do. And in a lot of cases it’s for these guys, it’s their work. As for Van, I didn’t want him to look like a gym rat. He’s not a bodybuilder. He’s someone whose body is functional for him and it’s utilitarian and as well as a policeman, he’s somebody who it’s really functional for him. And I’m thinking about these guys who cowboy who probably played sports in high school, you know when you see those guys who are in their 30s and you’re like, “Oh, I can tell you were an athlete when you were young and you’re not in the same,” but there was still a little bit of it lingering.
Latasha: I’m happy you understood my angle with that question.
Ben: Well, it’s an important question which reflects how you relate to and engage with the person you’re interviewing with.
Latasha: I know my time is wrapping-up with you. But let me ask this really quickly before I let you go. Obviously we know Taylor Sheridan, his body of work is impeccable. His writing, he’s a genius. The work speaks for itself. What do you admire most about his work ethic, his work style, his writing rhythm that you mentioned earlier? What is it that moves you the most?
Ben: I mean, you touched on a lot of things there. I mean, his work ethic is clearly something that really speaks for itself. Just his output speaks for itself. And so that’s clearly something that I admire, but there’s a lot to be admired about it. I mean, about the writing itself, I’m not the first actor who’s worked on his stuff to say it’s cowboy poetry. I have such admiration for not just writers, but for speakers as well, who are concise, who can be succinct, who can say a lot in very few words. And when you read a sentence, there’s a Hemingway quote. I hope I don’t butcher it, but I think … And Hemingway is a good example of someone who says a lot with very few words, but I think he just says, “Write clear and hard about what hurts.” I just think that’s a really good cue for anybody who’s sitting down to write something. I think in his own way, Taylor writes clearly and he writes hard and you read a script and again, there’s a muscularity and a stripped back musicality to it. It’s so much fun working with his writing. It’s so fun. It feels like a new script comes in, we’re all calling each other. Wow. Yeah, it’s great. I mean, I could talk about it forever, but yeah, there’s a lot to be admired and a lot to be enjoyed.
Latasha: Amazing. You just answered that in the most beautiful way. I promised this will be my last question. Are you happy with how your character Van Davis’s storyline continues to evolve? Are you happy with where Taylor is continuing to take things series and character storyline wise?
Ben: In the spirit of saying a lot in very few words, yes, I’m very happy. This has been a great pleasure. Thanks Latasha.
About “The Madison”
Introducing the Clyburns, “The Madison” is a heartfelt study of grief and human connection that follows a New York City family as they uproot their comfortable lives for the wild, untamed beauty of Montana’s Madison River Valley. Taylor Sheridan’s most intimate work to date, the series examines the ties that bind families together while unfolding across two distinct worlds—the vibrant energy of Manhattan and the beautiful landscape of central Montana.
The debut season, which premiered on March 14, 2025, consists of six episodes directed by Christina Alexandra Voros. Critics have described the drama as “deeply emotional, poignant and powerful,” highlighting a “powerhouse performance” by Michelle Pfeiffer. Following its successful launch, which garnered 8 million global views in its first ten days, the series has already been renewed for a second season.
When Is Season 2 Premiering:
The question is, when will Season 2 hit the big screen? Here is what you need to know: The Madison has already been renewed for a third season! While an official release date for Season 2 has not yet been announced, filming for the sophomore season has officially wrapped. Fans can expect the story to expand further as the early Season 3 renewal signals many more Clyburn stories to tell. Season 1 is currently available to stream on Paramount+.
The fans would like to know what’s next for The Madison, and we have the scoop: there is a whole lot more Clyburn family drama headed your way! Since Season 2 has already wrapped filming and Season 3 we feel will soon be in the works, clearly, the story is just getting started. As for those burning questions about the family’s journey toward healing? We all have to hold tight for those answers.
So let’s plan to reunite right here when the new episodes premiere—we’ll be sure to bring the KLEENEX!
“The Madison” Official Trailer:
