NEW YORK, Oct. 17 (UPI) — Sylvester Stallone’s mob western, Tulsa King, kicked off Season 4 on Paramount+ Friday night with the shocking deaths of two long-time characters.
Spoilers ahead.
The first episode ends with Neal McDonough’s character Cal Thresher, the governor of Oklahoma, and his adviser Margaret Devereaux (Dana Delany), unconscious, along with the pilot and co-pilot on a private plane.
Elsewhere, Joanne Manfredi (Annabella Sciorra) is waking up her crime boss brother Dwight (Stallone) to tearfully tell him the plane carrying his girlfriend Margaret has gone down over the Pacific Ocean.
“If they want to bring me back, I would love it. If they don’t want to bring me back, that’s fine. I had the best time for three years playing in that awesome sandbox,” McDonough, 60, told UPI in a recent Zoom interview.
“I thought it was a great idea, the demise of Cal after that first episode. I thought it was great for television. You can’t put yourself above the show. You certainly can’t put yourself above the lead of the show and it’s not the Cal Thresher show. It’s the Dwight Manfredi show,” he explained.
“What’s the best way to create more drama for his character? And I think what they did for that first episode was kind of genius and I think also Taylor Sheridan is a master when it comes to that kind of thing and taking out characters that you thought would never be taken out.”
At the time of his presumed death, Cal had reached something of a detente with Dwight, his former romantic rival for Margaret’s affections.
“It’s gotten so much more layered and challenging and difficult and better at the same time. We see each other more now as adversaries, for sure,” McDonough said.
“But we can use each other and there’s respect for each other that we have because he’s driven to be the best that he can be and, now, finally, Cal Thresher has found something that he’s driven to be the best that he can be and that’s to be a politician,” he added.
“He dabbled in the marijuana world. That didn’t work and he didn’t really like it. So, as a wealthy guy, he’s [asking]: ‘OK, what can I do to improve this life of mine? What’s the best usage of me?’ And to be the governor of the great state of Oklahoma is something that you finally realize, ‘This is something I can be really good at, something I can give back and make the amazing state of Oklahoma even more amazing.'”
He also accepts that Margaret genuinely loves Dwight and not him.
“It’s not so much the personal feelings of wanting a relationship that way. I think they’ve used each other well to get to where they wanted to get and they got there and they got there together,” the actor noted.
“So, there’s an admiration more than a love affair type of thing,” he added. “I admire her brain. She thinks differently. I really enjoyed the relationship that they built for Dana and I, especially down the home stretch.”
McDonough can also now be seen in Angel and the Badman. Next month, he will co-star in Jimmy.
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