Landman’s Michelle Randolph Says 'Being Comfortable in Your Sexuality' Should Be 'Celebrated' amid Character Backlash (Exclusive)

This post contains spoilers from the Landman Season 1 finale.

Michelle Randolph is not afraid of the judgment that the audience might have about her Landman character.

The 27-year-old actress, who broke out in in 1923plays 17-year-old Ainsley Norris in Taylor Sheridan’s Paramount+ series about an oilman (Billy Bob Thornton) and his family in a West Texas town.

A troublemaker from her debut, the sexually confident Ainsley challenges her father Tommy (Thornton) at every turn, and in one particularly sassy scene she tells her dad about her and her boyfriend’s deal when it comes to sex.

Randolph tells PEOPLE that she had been working on the scripts for the first four episodes for “some time” before filming began in Fort Worth last January, and the much-talked-about scene between her and her onscreen father was what she was up to audition.

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“So that was who it was right away [Ainsley] he’s been, for so long,” says Randolph, though he admits that the conversation in the first episode is what comes to mind as a particular scene or moment in the series.

However, she admits: “When I first read it [the scripts]I had to digest. And then it just became like it was her. She never surprised me in any way when I found her.”

“It was interesting to see the audience’s reaction to it because I’ve been watching it for a long time,” she says, referring to the somewhat harsh response viewers had to Ainsley — flying around her father’s house — where he lives with another oilman and a lawyer — in skimpy bikinis and short cannons during most of the season. “It was like, ‘Oh, well, we’re all going to work this together again.'”

Michelle Randolph as Ainsley Norris, Ali Larter as Angela Norris and Billy Bob Thornton as Tommy Norris in ‘Landman’.

Emerson Miller/Paramount+

Having sat with Ainsley for so long, she remembers thinking the answer was, “‘Why is this a big deal?'” It was “old news” to her.

“I think being comfortable in your sexuality is something that should be celebrated. If that’s what you feel as a human being [and] aligned with who you are, then be authentically who you are. And that’s what she’s doing,” says Randolph. “Even though she’s 17, I think as she gets older, she’ll set more boundaries and understand more about the way the world works. But as far as she’s concerned, right now, this is the way she’s been raised and she’s going to figure out if she thinks it’s right or wrong or if she wants to change it.”

She continues, “I’m so proud of the show we made, so I just didn’t allow myself to have any perspective on what the audience was thinking. I think I’ve said before, [that] I split up [during certain scenes]but somehow you have to. I was doing my job while I was shooting, and then I closed the door and we put him outside, and I hope to continue the character and that’s all I can do.”

Michelle Randolph as Ainsley Norris in ‘Landman’.

Ryan Green/Paramount+

It also helped to have such a strong relationship in real life with Ali Larter, who plays Ainsley’s equally out-there mom, Angela.

“I think that’s part of the reason why Ali and I got really close because we had each other, because her character is similar to Ainsley in some of the things she says, so we as a duo – we can confide in each other,” she says. “And that made me feel a lot better, especially because [Larter’s] she’s been in the industry for so long, so she’s seen this go, so I felt really safe with her.”

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The finale also gave Randolph — whose older sister Cassie dated Colton Underwood a year after appearing on his season Bachelor — a chance to explore a more vulnerable side of Ainsley, as she finally got what she was looking for: Ryder (Mitchell Slaggert) holding her as they spent the night together.

“I think it kind of speaks to who she is at her core,” she says of the finale. “[Ainsley] she can act like this very confident woman or young woman but [she] still needs security at the end of the day. And that’s something she learned a lot from her father.”

Billy Bob Thornton as Tommy Norris, Michelle Randolph as Ainsley Norris and Ali Larter as Angela Norris in ‘Landman’.

Emerson Miller/Paramount+

Like the rest of her cast – which includes Jon Hamm, Demi Moore and Kayla Wallace – Randolph hopes to pack her bags soon for another stint in Texas, and she says Ainsley will “grow as a person” which is “really excited to see” in a potential Season 2.

“She’s not a 17-year-old pretending to hate her life or her parents. It’s like she’s a 17-year-old who’s just excited. Everything’s bright and she’s happy, and I love that so much.”

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It’s safe to say she learned a thing or two from the lively, outgoing teenager. “Her confidence is so contagious and how honest and simple she is… She’s just so herself. And so I felt like, when you go in with that energy every day for so long, it’s impossible for it not to rub off on you.”

“I’m naturally a very filtered person because I’m a Virgo and Ainsley isn’t, and I love that about her. It’s so refreshing,” she adds.

In his own life, however, Randolph plans to “tone it down a little bit.”

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Season 1 finale Landman now streaming on Paramount+.

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Source: HIS Education