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Zoe Saldaña has high praise for Taylor Sheridan
The Lioness actress gave a shout out to the series creator during the Wednesday, July 29, New York City premiere of season 3
“These are incredible complex individuals [and] any actor who challenges themselves can rise to that occasion,” she said of the show’s characters
Zoe Saldaña is a fan of “how gender-fluid” Taylor Sheridan wrote the characters in Lioness.
During the Wednesday, July 29, season 3 premiere of Lioness in New York City, Saldaña, 48, raved about how the series creator, 56, writes women — and everyone else in the show.
“I do believe that Joe [McNamara] could’ve been a man. We’ve seen various stories of men like Joe,” she said of her character during a screening. “And Kaitlyn [Meade] could’ve been a man, the same way [Byron] Westfield could’ve been a woman, Kyle [McManus] could’ve been a woman. These are incredible complex individuals [and] any actor who challenges themselves can rise to that occasion.”
Zoe Saldana at the ‘Lioness’ season 3 New York Premiere at SVA Theater on July 29, 2026 in New York City
Credit: TheStewartofNY/FilmMagic
Saldaña added that she feels as if “that is what makes a really good writer.”
“When you write something so incredible that it kind of defies gender and race, and it’s just about the merit of that human being, I feel like you give yourself the opportunity of a wider range of actors that can come in and sort of vie for that part,” she said. “I have a great deal of respect for men that really know how to write women and I think that Taylor gives himself enough credit.”
She concluded, “I’m happy to say that, after playing one of his female characters for three seasons, I’m incredibly honored that he wrote Joe as a woman.”
Jill Wagner, who plays Bobby in the spy thriller, added that Yellowstone mastermind is “often” one of the “most powerful people” in a room. “Whether he wants to be or not. He is a force and I do think he puts a little bit of himself in each one of these characters,” Wagner, 47, said. “Like, I see Taylor in almost every single character. That’s something he does naturally.”
Saldaña then joked, “Oh great, so he writes himself? Here I am thinking he writes great women!”
Zoe Saldaña as Joe in ‘Lioness’
Credit: Emerson Miller/Paramount+
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The latest season of Lioness, which also features Morgan Freeman, Genesis Rodriguez and Michael Kelly, finds Joe confronting “enemies operating in the shadows, leaving her to reckon with a war that now reaches into every part of her life,” per a synopsis.
Speaking with Entertainment Weekly in June, Saldaña said she spoke with Sheridan about the storyline ahead of production. “I really am so happy and proud of the direction that he eventually took,” she said. “It was very demanding, I’m not gonna lie. And I didn’t even know if I was gonna be able to pull it off.”
She added that the show “strikes a rare balance between high-octane action and genuine emotional depth.”
“I don’t think I would be able to be a part of a show that would only be action without having these intersectional relationships with these incredibly complex women,” Saldaña added.
Season 3 of Lioness will premiere on Paramount+ on Sunday, Aug. 2.
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