Ole 'Dutch' Would Have Approved: The 'Justified' Finale And Producer Graham Yost on Who Survived — and Those Elmore Leonard Tributes

My wife and I enjoyed watching the finale of the TV series Justified tonight.

We've been watching Justified for the entire six seasons and we felt that the ending was done very well and in keeping with the unique style of the late great crime writer, Elmore "Dutch" Leonard.

Marisa Roffman at the Hollywood Reporter interviewed Graham Yost, the TV series producer, about the ending and the tributes to Elmore Leonard.

You can read the interview via the below link:

[Warning: This post contains spoilers from Justified's series finale.]

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/justified-finale-graham-yost-raylan-788476

You can also read my Crime Beat column on Elmore Leonard via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2009/05/return-to-elmoreland-elmore-leonards.html

Justifying Rayland: The Importance Of The Elmore Leonard Character

 

Dave Odegard at wordandfilm.com offers a piece on Elmore Leonard's character Rayland Givens, as portrayed by actor Timothy Olyphant in the TV series Justified.

There's a great scene about two-thirds of the way through a recent episode of the current and final season of "Justified."

In it, Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, skillfully played as always by Timothy Olyphant, has just pulled up to a house where his series-long nemesis (and occasional ally) Appalachian outlaw Boyd Crowder, equally deftly portrayed by Walton Goggins, is staying. Crowder rushes out to meet Givens and the two quickly begin a verbal sparring match (fueled mainly by Crowder's desire to keep Givens from finding a wanted fugitive hiding inside) in which Givens reveals that the only thing keeping him from moving on to live with his ex-wife and baby in Florida is his vow to finally bring Crowder down.

"This is one of them classic stories where the hero gets his man and he rides off into the sunset," Givens says.

"Or maybe it's like that other classic, where a guy chases a whale to the ends of the earth only to drown for his trouble," Crowder shoots back.

After a pause, Givens smiles and declares: "I gotta admit, there's a small part of me that's going to miss this when it's over."

It's a fantastic moment in a cable series full of fantastic moments. For the past five years, "Justified" on F/X has been offering a guaranteed reoccurring dose of satisfaction for those in need of smart television crime-drama - with a neo-Western twist of course.

It's also become the premier entry in Elmore Leonard's pop-culture footprint, which is no small feat when you realize he wrote more than forty novels and there are more than two dozen screen versions of his work. And it's really surprising when you notice just how slight Raylan Givens originally was in the library of Leonard's work.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.wordandfilm.com/2015/04/justifying-raylan-the-importance-elmore-leonard-character/

'Justified' Creator Aims To Stay True To The Late Writer Elmore Leonard

Terry Gross at NPR's Fresh Air interviewed Graham Yost, the producer of TV's Justified, the crime show based on the late great crime writer Elmore Leonard's novella, Fire in the Hole.

The FX series Justified, which is in its sixth and final season, is based on the novella Fire in the Hole by Elmore Leonard. Leonard was an executive producer of the series until his death in 2013. The show's creator and showrunner, Graham Yost, says he has made it his mission to stay as true as he can to Leonard's vision and storytelling style.

"Ultimately I look at this show as Elmore Leonard's show, and we're all in service of him and his view and his way of writing and creating these characters," Yost tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross. "So whatever feels like it works within that world is something we're open to."

Set in Harlan County, Ky., which is coal mining country, the story revolves around two men who have known each other since they were in the mines together as teens: Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, and Boyd Crowder, played by Walton Goggins. Raylan is now a deputy U.S. marshal and Boyd is an outlaw whose criminal activities include robbing banks. Raylan wants to move to Florida to reconnect with his ex-wife and their 5-month-old child, but first he wants to bring Boyd down, which means catching him when he pulls off his next heist.

The show is violent, but Yost says he and the writers have to walk a line to keep the network happy.

"Elmore's world is a violent world," he says. "In the best Elmore scenes, you think that something is either going to take a hard turn into romance and some kind of liaison, or it's going to take it the other way and go into violence. There's often something oddly humorous about the violence in Elmore's movies and in his books."

You can read the rest of the piece and listen to NPR's audio clip via the below link:

http://www.npr.org/2015/03/26/395534419/justified-creator-aims-to-stay-true-to-the-late-writer-elmore-leonard

Note: You can also read my Crime Beat column on Elmore Leonard, one of my favorite writers, via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2009/05/return-to-elmoreland-elmore-leonards.html

Return To Elmoreland: Timothy Olyphant On Final Season of 'Justified,' The TV Program Based On Elmore Leonard's Deputy U.S. Marshal Character

Allen Barra interviewed actor Timothy Olyphant at the dailybeast.com on the final season of Justified and the passing of the great crime writer Elmore Leonard.

Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, played  by Timothy Olyphant, has a quiet amiability which belies the intensity of a man who yearns to clean up Harlan County, USA, the hell hole of unemployment, meth labs, and racism where he grew up.  Olyphant has garnered an Emmy nomination and won the praise of the author who created Raylan, Elmore Leonard.

Raylan is a lawman for our time who works not for the ideology-tinged FBI but the most dangerous arm of American law enforcement agencies, the U.S. Marshals Service. His tan Stetson connects him symbolically with a century of movie and television good guys, but, as the color indicates, Raylan can never quite be the unvarnished hero. His ties to Harlan through blood, marriage, and history constantly draw him into dangerous compromises which blur the lines between lawman and outlaw.

Tonight marks the premiere of the sixth and final season of Justified, and fans will be glued to their seats wondering which, if any, of the show’s characters will survive the Marshals office’s final assault on the drug-ravaged, welfare-gutted hills of Harlan County.

Timothy Olyphant spoke to us about these and other topics from his home in California.

Sorry to start out on a sad note, but Elmore Leonard died almost a year and a half ago. I know everybody loved to see him on set, and he enjoyed being there. What is life like without Elmore?

We were all affected by his passing because he always had some interesting observation to make and was always there if you had a question for him. But I don’t think our attitudes about the show changed any when he was no longer with us. We’re all very much aware that it was his world, and we’re just lucky to be living in it. 

You can read the rest of the interview via the below link:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/01/20/timothy-olyphant-i-know-what-happens-to-raylan-at-the-end-of-justified.html

You can also read my Crime Beat column on Elmore Leonard via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2009/05/return-to-elmoreland-elmore-leonards.html

You can also read my Counterterorism magazine interview with retired U.S. Marshal Mike Earp on hunting the worst-of-the-worst criminals via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2014/12/hunting-worst-of-worst-criminals-my-q.html  

"Justified" Rides Toward Its Last Roundup

Oriana Schwindt at TV Guide offers a piece on the final season of one of my favorite TV series, Justified.

The sun is quickly setting on Justified.

As the contemporary Western's cast and crew shoot a scene for the show's penultimate season, the light is going, even though it's only 4:15pm. But in the mountains of California's Angeles National Forest — which are standing in for the deep, dark hills of Kentucky, the show's setting — the sun rises late and sets early.

The crew is set up in front of Audrey's, the bar and brothel that's seen plenty of action — of all kinds — throughout the show's five seasons. The aboveground pool shot up by Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens (Timothy Olphant) in the Season 5 premiere sits near one of the trailers as director Michael Dinner tries to salvage the shot, one in which Raylan tells a DEA agent (guest star Eric Roberts) to "f--- off," as Olyphant puts it.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.tvguide.com/News/Justified-On-Set-1077863.aspx

Blue Dreams: Elmore Leonard's U.S. Deputy Marshal Raylan Givens Character To Appear In His Next Novel

Neal Rubin's column at the Detroit News offers the news that fans of crime writer Elmore Leonard's character U.S. deputy marshal Raylan Givens will see much more of him in the future.

Justified, the FX series based on an Elmore Leonard novella, was renewed this week for a fourth season. That's a good thing on several levels, Leonard says, starting with the fact that he just plain likes the character, federal marshal Raylan Givens.

Leonard, 86, appreciates Givens so much that he'll star again in his next novel, which is called Blue Dreams and was 15 pages along as of Wednesday. That's after appearing in the novella "Fire in the Hole," plus several earlier books and Leonard's current bestseller, Raylan: A Novel (William Morrow, $26.99).

You can read the rest of the column via the below link:

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20120308/OPINION03/203080376/Elmore-Leonard-s-Justified-character-appears-steadily-TV-books?odyssey=mod%7Cnewswell%7Ctext%7CEntertainment%7Cp

The above photo show Elmore Leonard in the center between Justified producer Graham Yost and actor Timothy Olyphant.

Book Em': Elmore Leonard's U.S. Marshal Character Goes From TV Back To A Book With 'Raylan'

Vince Cosgrove at NJ.com reviewed Elmore Leonard's new crime thriller Raylan.

Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, whose Stetson rides high and whose gun is quick, returns in Elmore Leonard’s latest thriller — after appearing in the novels “Pronto” and “Riding the Rap,” and the short story “Fire in the Hole.”

That story inspired “Justified,” the hit series that stars Timothy Olyphant as Raylan (its third season kicks off Tuesday on FX). Leonard thinks so highly of “Justified” that he dedicated “Raylan” to Olyphant and Graham Yost, the series’ creator

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://www.nj.com/entertainment/arts/index.ssf/2012/01/raylan_a_book_review.html

I'm a big fan of Elmore Leonard and I like his Raylan Givens character in his novels and short stories and on the TV show Justified. I look forward to reading Raylan.

FX's Crime Drama Justified Hits The Mark

I've long been a fan of crime writer Elmore Leonard and I'm also a fan of Justified, the television program based on one of Leonard's characters, U.S. Deputy Marshal Raylan Givens.

I recently reread Riding the Rap, a Leonard crime novel that features Raylan Givens, and I saw how well actor Timothy Olyphant is portraying the Givens character.

Elmore Leonard is fond of Olyphant and the TV program as well (Leonard appears in the above photo with Olyphant).

TVGuide.com published an interesting piece on Justified and offered the below: 

It's clear to the nearly four million Oly-fans who tune in to FX's adaptation of crime-novel mastermind Elmore Leonard's work each week that everybody involved is having a blast. "Elmore doesn't know how to write anything that's not cool," Olyphant raves of the Get Shorty/Be Cool/Out of Sight author. "When it really cooks, it's just a great job."

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.tvguide.com/News/FX-Justified-Story-1031198.aspx

You can also read my online column on Elmore Leonard via the below link:

http://pauldavisoncrime.blogspot.com/2009/05/return-to-elmoreland-elmore-leonards.html

An Interview With Timothy Olyphant

I watched and enjoyed the first episode of Justified, season two, this week.

I believe the TV program truly captures crime writer Elmore Leonard's original and quirky characters.

Timothy Olyphant, who stars as Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, is interviewed by Collider.com.

You can read the interview via the below link:

http://collider.com/timothy-olyphant-interview-justified-season-2/75640/