Utah Stories copy editor Dave Jensen labored for 3 seasons on the set of Kevin Costner’s Yellowstone sequence in a number of places, and he has some tales to inform!
Until just lately, when a well being situation made it too tough, Jensen was the proprietor of Wasatch Snake Removal, LLC, — the one Utah-based firm licensed by the Utah State Division of Wildlife Resources to relocate city rattlesnakes statewide for the protection of snakes and folks.
From 2014 till the autumn of 2022, Jensen and his staff of eight relocators labored on name, relocating “nuisance” rattlesnakes for Wasatch Front householders, business homeowners, police departments, The University of Utah, The Natural History Museum, and lots of different state and personal entities.
“Protecting rattlesnakes and teaching people about them has always been a deeply important cause for me,” Jensen stated, “because snakes are such vital members of healthy ecosystems. Most of our customers know this, and they call us because they don’t want anything bad to happen to the snake in their yard.”
One of the perks of being an city snake relocator is that film productions are required to have a snake wrangler on set, and for that cause, Wasatch Snake Removal is registered with the Utah Film Commission.
“It’s a liability issue,” Jensen defined. “Most sets have a paramedic, a security officer, and a snake wrangler at their outdoor shooting locations. That way, they can’t be sued if someone gets injured, property gets stolen, or someone gets bitten by a snake. They can say they took all the proper precautions.”
In 2015, when Don Johnson was in Utah filming Blood and Oil for ABC, Jensen would drive to the units in Summit and Wasatch Counties. His job was to be the primary to enter a location and clear it of snakes for the protection of the actors and crew, and to be looking out for curious snakes which may crawl into the realm throughout filming. California movie crews don’t wish to see a snake. Any snake.
“Those were long days,” Jensen stated. Time is money, and a shoot will final anyplace from 10 to 16 hours. It’s scorching, tiring, typically boring work, however the meals and money are good!”
One morning, the final van leaving the staging space for the set was carrying the celebrities of the present, except for Don Johnson. Jensen caught a experience with them.
“Max Theriot is a really nice guy, and very talkative,” Jensen recalled.
Jensen was current for a lot of of Yellowstone’s iconic scenes. He watched Kevin Costner and different forged members rehearse their traces, however didn’t get an opportunity to fulfill him. Then, within the fall of 2020, after filming at varied places all summer season, Jensen was known as to a Yellowstone set simply exterior of Henefer.
“It was a chilly morning in October, and snake season was over. There was a skiff of snow on the ground. I tried to tell them they didn’t need me that day because snakes don’t come out in those conditions, but they insisted. They were filming a scene with live vultures on the side of a mountain road, and there must have been 200 people there. We were all wearing jackets, gloves and hats, and there I was, walking around with a snake stick and bucket. I felt like an idiot. A truck door opened and a man’s voice said, ‘Catch any snakes yet?’ It was Kevin Costner. ‘I think they all froze to death last night,’ I answered. He laughed and closed the door.”
Jensen and his staff labored on a number of productions over the previous 9 years, together with Sonic the Hedgehog ‘Blue Blur’, The Happy Worker (unreleased), an unnamed Disney manufacturing, Costner’s Horizon sequence, a overseas manufacturing, and as a private snake wrangler for singer Kelsea Ballerini.
Ultimately, his purpose was to have Wasatch Snake Removal listed within the credit of at the least one main movement image, however that didn’t occur. Most of the locally-filmed productions had been for tv solely, and the actually massive ones typically fly their very own snake wranglers in from Los Angeles, despite the fact that it prices them extra. Jensen is happy with the work he and his staff did. “We met a lot of nice people and had a lot of fun. Today, when I watch a show like Yellowstone, I know how much time and effort went into creating those scenes,” he stated.
Featured picture by Jordan Miner.
