‘The Hunting Wives’ Season 2? Creator Spills on Netflix Future

[This story contains major spoilers from the season finale of The Hunting Wives.]

Upper class Texan women who like to shoot guns, drink and hit the party circuit — and who maybe kill people — are having a moment thanks to The Hunting Wives.

The Netflix series from creator Rebecca Cutter that stars Malin Akerman and Brittany Snow needs little introduction by now. The Hunting Wives hit a new milestone last week when it became the most-viewed streaming series in the U.S., after hanging out in the Netflix Top 10 for more than a month following its July 21 release.

But the binge-y, erotic crime thriller wasn’t always at Netflix. Cutter, who created Starz drama Hightown, was initially making The Hunting Wives also for Starz. The cable network’s tagline is “We’re All Adults Here,” which explains how the racy series — complete with more nudity, sex, violence and politics than you might expect from a typical Netflix offering — ended up at the streaming giant. Heading into Starz’s split from Lionsgate in May (which became official this summer), the TV studio behind The Hunting Wives pivoted and took Cutter’s series to the open market. (Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter the show didn’t fit Starz’s go-forward programming strategy as a standalone network; Starz and Lionsgate agreed on the parting.)

There was buzz by then around The Hunting Wives, an adaptation of May Cobb’s 2021 bestseller that is produced by Lionsgate Television and 3 Arts Entertainment. Netflix was the most aggressive and quickly jumped, confirming a summer release for only weeks later and prompting Lionsgate to mobilize a grassroots marketing campaign around the acquisition. “Rebecca is a risk-taker. There’s nothing tentative in her approach to these characters; it was a big and noisy idea that would really make you lean in,” says Kevin Beggs, Lionsgate Television Group chair and chief creative officer. “We were hopeful it would perform, but none of us could have imagined the instant reaction and then the staying power of the show.”

The Hunting Wives became the sexed-up social commentary success of summer, tapping into the zeitgeist and flooding Cutter’s social media feed with hot takes from both critics and viewers about how The Hunting Wives brought both sex and the culture wars back to TV, as it centers on the East Texan clique of conservative wives. Some viewers were even questioning their sexuality over the main romance between Akerman and Snow’s characters, queen bee Margo and the new liberal in town, Sophie, respectively. The streamer is already in discussions with the Hunting Wives team for a second season, per a source.

“I’ve heard some people say that the show is part of this new mandate to make red-state content, and that wasn’t what it was. I mean, it was for horny middle-aged women,” Cutter tells THR of her “anti-prestige” addictive series. “It got to come into Netflix feeling really different than any other show on Netflix.”

Below, the creator, writer and showrunner shares more of The Hunting Wives‘ journey from Starz to Netflix while opening up about her multi-season plan and revealing some of her season two ideas as she awaits an official renewal following that very intentional and wild cliffhanger finale: “This was never, in my mind, a limited series,” she says of more Margo and Sophie to come.

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There’s no one in my social circle who hasn’t binged The Hunting Wives by now.

That’s amazing. My husband watched it, and he was like, “Well, it’s not as good as your other show, but it’s pretty good.” I was like, OK, tough crowd!

All of these weeks later, the show is still topping the streaming charts. It’s fun to speak with you after you’ve been engaging with the viewer response all summer. What has this ride been like for you — is your social media feed nonstop?

Pretty much. It’s starting to slow down a little bit, and I don’t know if I’ll be sad when it’s over. For a little while I was like, “This is a full-time job.” But it’s amazing. Especially considering that this show was made for Starz. I’ve had a show on Starz [Hightown, for three seasons]. It doesn’t matter how good the show is, it just doesn’t get this big of a response in my experience. And for a while, it was questionable if The Hunting Wives was even coming out at all. So then once I heard it was at Netflix, it was like, “OK, that’s the best possible outcome.” And I started to feel like it could be a hit. But you don’t know. No one called me from Netflix, they kind of threw it up there [when it released]. So really, who knows? I was thinking, maybe it’ll be like Adolescence and be popular, or maybe it will just come and go. Who knows?

Since it was an acquisition, there wasn’t the typical pre-promotion with Malin Akerman or Brittany Snow hitting the talk show circuit, or a big press day.

Right. There wasn’t a premiere [event]. Lionsgate did a good job of creating a viral campaign, but otherwise it was pretty low key.

So let’s go back to chart this Hunting Wives journey from Starz to Netflix. When did you first write the show?

I pitched it in the spring of 2022. But literally, the same day I pitched it to Starz, they ordered a third season of Hightown. [President of original programming at Starz] Kathryn Busby called me like, “Hey, we’re buying your pitch and we’re picking up Hightown.” I couldn’t even start writing The Hunting Wives until after [Hightown season three]. So I think I wrote the pilot in fall of 2022, and then the writers room was early 2023 and then got interrupted by the strike, and then came back and finished fall 2023 and we shot in 2024.

So once your writers room was going, you were making this show for Starz.

Yes.

Then you finished filming and what happened?

So then we were in post[-production]. We’re going along making a show for Starz, but they’re just never giving us an airdate. This was all in the lead up to the divorce between Lionsgate and Starz. And it was like, “I think it would be best for everyone if we just sold it elsewhere.” So again, all of the credit to Lionsgate, because they had a good handle on how to do that, also going through [the foreign market] and all of that. From my perspective, that’s how it went down.

Were you involved or aware of who they were shopping the show to after parting ways with Starz?

I had a vague idea, but I wasn’t totally up in it. They had a foreign screening first. They were going to sell the foreign rights anyway, because Starz doesn’t have the foreign platform anymore. I think there was the idea of, “This is going to get a lot of attention, and it could fuel a domestic sale as well.”

So once it landed at Netflix, how quickly did you get a release date?

Really fast. That was the really surprising thing, too. I remember we were sitting around in late spring and I’m thinking, “I don’t know where it’s going to air, but whoever ends up with it, it’s going to take months and months.” And then it was like, “No, we want it for July 21.” We didn’t even have key art finished. Suzy Feldman at Lonsgate dove in and was like, “OK, we have a week and a half.” They made the trailer internally, which I thought was an awesome trailer. It was all hands on deck — just like: go.

One of the big changes you made from the book was to pepper in more hot-button, timely politics into this murder mystery, including about abortion laws and the state of reproductive rights in Texas. I imagine you would have been bummed if the show didn’t get a quick release.

Yes, although it’s all stuff that I wrote in 2022.

Do you think if you were making this show at Netflix initially, you could have made it as erotic?

Probably not. The tagline for Starz, to their great credit, is: “We’re all adults here.” This is my second show for them. They have no problem with very sexual and violent content, and pushing the envelope on respectability, I think, is part of it. But it might have even gone too far for them, because those were some of the notes we got in post, like, “Hoping maybe it was a little more prestige-y.” (Laughs.) So honestly, it ended up having the best life it could have, I think, because it got to come into Netflix feeling really different than any other show on Netflix. That’s not a knock on any show on Netflix. I’ve watched Netflix shows for years. We all have. But it did feel like not quite something that they would have made.

I’ve seen you reacting in interviews to the reception that The Hunting Wives is helping to bring sex back to TV. We can probably expect Netflix to order more content like this. What do you attribute to its resonance?

I think it just works. It’s fun, and it is sort of anti-prestige. I like to think there’s a Shonda Rhimes-level of, “Let’s burn story, baby. Every episode, multiple twists and turns.” But then it has a Game of Thrones-level of sexuality and nudity, and also being not afraid to go there in terms of queer sex. I think all of that felt fresh, but hopefully because the actors are so good and the chemistry is so good that it also doesn’t feel exploitative or just sex for sex’s sake. The girls aren’t in the background naked, weaving a basket. There’s a purpose to everything.

How did you first get involved with author May Cobb in adapting this? I know you eventually went and visited her and spent time with her in Texas.

I had a deal at Lionsgate at that time, and [The Hunting Wives executive producer] Erwin Stoff at 3 Arts [Entertainment], who optioned the book, is involved with Lionsgate a lot, because now they own 3 Arts. I think he originally called Jeff Hirsch [at Lionsgate] and told him he had this book. Jeff was very excited and said, “That’s perfect for us.” I think it was then Scott Herbst at Lionsgate who said, “You should send it to Rebecca Cutter. She’s a crime writer who does Hightown, and see if she responds to the book.” We talked when I was in the airport. He sent it to me, and I read the PDF on the airplane. I was like, “Here we go, baby.” It’s so horny, it’s so fun.

SB8 [the state senate bill also known as the “Texas Heartbeat Act”] had just passed the day before in Texas. This is 2021 and pre-Roe v. Wade falling, but it was one of the first super restrictive abortion bills in Texas. I heard about that one day, then read this book that has this abortion plot in Texas the next day. I was like, “If we’re going to do it, let’s do it.” I was thinking, “Well, if I said I want to do culture war stuff, they’re not going to let me, but let me just see.” And instead they were actually like, “Great, yeah, let’s do that.”

I was pretty clear about wanting to do that, because that wasn’t in the book. I wanted to make [Sophie, Snow’s character] a fish out of water and lean into it. [Writer’s note: In the show, she’s a Northeast Democratic operative who relocates to Texas with her family.] In the book, she’s from Texas and going back home. But I’m not a Texan. My entrée is as a liberal elite. That’s how I would be more interested in seeing this. But I didn’t make that change to make the show more political. It was more to make it feel more specific. Like, who are these women? Who are the upper middle class white ladies shooting guns and drinking who don’t work? Who would the “hunting wives” be? Well, they would be conservatives, obviously.

I’ve heard some people say that the show is part of this new mandate to make red-state content, and that wasn’t what it was. I mean, it was for horny middle-aged women. The politics were to try and make it more specific, and maybe some part of my belief system is in there too, but I was trying very hard to be fair to all the characters. I don’t want to make a show where I’m despising half the characters. That’s not fun as a writer.

How do you feel Texans are responding to the show?

I never was a TikTok person, but I started to watch all the videos and it’s been so amazing. Every kind of person digs the show. I mean, there’s plenty of people who don’t dig it. I have seen some videos of people turning it off. I don’t make a video every time I turn something off! But it seems like Southern women, Christian women, Black women, white women, lesbians, gay men [all like it] — it feels like the show has hit a large vein of people that like it for whatever reason and maybe for all different reasons. I’ve seen a few people saying it’s not realistic. And then a few other people will be like, “Oh, no, I’m from here. It’s kind of realistic.”

You said you thought you might have something big when you were making the show, but you couldn’t predict how long it would stay in Netflix’s Top 10. Do you feel like it’s a perfect formula for right now?

I’m really blown away. Who knows what’s going to be a hit? I try really hard not hedge my bets or chase the market. I always feel like I’m my best when I do what I’m good at, and I can’t really focus on the results. But me and Erwin would sit in post — I’ve seen these episodes 100 times — and you can’t really stop watching once you start. I did know that. I didn’t know how big of an audience we were going to get, but I did think people would finish the show. It’s a tight little murder mystery with a ton of shocking stuff.

What feedback were you getting from Netflix, and what feedback are you getting now that everyone is, I’m sure, eyeing a second season?

When they bought it, there were no changes [so we didn’t have conversations]. I have spoken to them now. I heard early on that the show was having a really good finishing rate, but nothing so concrete. Just nice conversations.

Have you had any chats about season two?

Nothing official, but I feel like everybody wants that! [Writer’s note: Netflix is in talks for a season two, per a source.]

The biggest change you made is the ending, and I want to dive into that, but I also bring that up because your ending very clearly sets up a second season. Were you feeling really confident when you wrote the show, to end it in a way where we need more?

Even when it was at Starz, it was never, in my mind, a limited series. From what I gather, doing more than three [seasons] is hard, so three is a great number. But I could do it forever. It’s so fun. The girls are so fun. We love it.

It’s a bummer that Katie Lowes can’t be back. [Writer’s note: A change from the book was that Lowes’ character, Jill, dies. In the book, Jill kills her son’s girlfriend, Abby, along with Margo, to protect her son after Abby had an abortion. In the series, Margo is the killer and is left alive.]

Or Chrissy Metz [who played Abby’s mom] — so many deaths!

What was your casting process for finding Malin Akerman and Brittany Snow as Margo and Sophie, respectively? Did you see a lot of people for the main roles?

No. We cast Malin first. We had a casting director that Erwin had worked with a lot in L.A., Jeanne McCarthy. It was that early process of making lists, but she said, “May I recommend Malin Akerman? I think she’s exceedingly talented, and as an actress she’s fearless, and I think that’s what you need.” And that was enough. I said, “Yes, I know her work. Great idea.”

We sent her all the scripts over Christmas. She was in Sweden. She read all eight scripts in three days and emailed, “I love this. Let’s meet.” We had lunch with Malin, along with director Julie Anne Robinson, me and Erwin, and it was a lovefest. That was the most important character to cast first, because she is the linchpin. Margo isn’t necessarily the biggest part. We certainly see everything through Sophie’s eyes, so Brittany Snow is the star of the show. But the Margo character needs to work, because you need to believe that Sophie is going to get swept up in like four hours. Like, in a day and a half, she’s going to be a lesbian. Who’s going to do that for you? Malin Akerman is going to do that for you.

Then it was back to a list again [for Sophie], and it was Brittany Snow. We have incredible trust in this casting director and we love Brittany. I love that she can do comedy. She can come off really vulnerable. She’s incredibly smart. Just everything about her, and all of her questions were the right ones. So we had those two off the bat, and then Dermot [Mulroney] also did not audition. We had breakfast with him. He is having so much fun [with the show]. I love his Jed Banks [Margo’s husband]. Jed is barely a character in the book, and then this guy just comes on in.

It seems Jed also can come back for season two. [Writer’s note: The season ended with Jed kicking Margo out as he moves along with his campaign for governor of Texas.]

Oh, yes. He will!

Did you do any chemistry reads with Brittany and Malin?

No, we didn’t.

What was their first intimate scene that you shot?

The two big lake house scenes in episodes three and four — when they play spin the bottle and then their first sex scenes — were filmed in the same block with director Melanie Mayron. So we were holed up in that lake house, and that was the same week. I was there for that. They had the scene where Sophie sees Margo and Brad [Jill’s high school son played by George Ferrier] having sex through the window that I wasn’t there for earlier.

Their first meeting was also an intimate one, when Sophie walks in on Margo and Margo drops her dress and exposes herself in the bathroom.

Yes, it all happened quick. That’s what’s so great about Malin, she’s just so game. She was so ready. There was never a question of, “Is this gratuitous?” That scene was the first one I ever pictured in my head. When I started to pitch the show, that was the moment. Because it had the tampon — the clue that was eventually going to pay off [that makes Sophie realize later that Margo was the killer]. There was a scene that was cut from the show before the bathroom scene, but in the script, Sophie came in with a new dress and Graham [Sophie’s husband played by Evan Jonigkeit] is like, “You should wear this sluttier dress.” And she’s like, “No, I can’t.” So you could tell there’s this weird repression going on with her and with the husband and sexuality. So here is this woman, Sophie, having a panic attack, and then she walks in on this woman [Margo], who, thirty seconds later, drops her dress. It was scripted as a jumpsuit. But you have to take the whole thing off; I was trying to be realistic. We just could not find a jumpsuit that came off elegantly, so we went with the dress.

It works because it was like, who does that? Margo does that.

It’s a power play. This woman is so comfortable in herself, but she’s putting it in your face. Are you going to look away? Who are you as a person? That was a perfect character moment that also had a plot function.

You said they got the whole script, so they knew what they were signing on for, and I know you had an intimacy coordinator on set. But was there anything they blushed at?

I wouldn’t say they blushed at it. I think they just wanted it to look really good and sexy and real. Our intimacy coordinator, Lizzy Talbot, is amazing. We have very frank meetings, but also, “How do we make this look sexy? How do you make it look better? How do you make it look real? What is the choreography?” Everyone just wanted it to come out great. I don’t think anybody felt like they were being pushed to do something they didn’t want to do or didn’t believe in.

So the twisty ending is a huge change. Since you had this collaborative relationship with May, how did she react to you changing so much, including Sophie driving drunk, again, and killing Margo’s brother, and that Margo doesn’t die in the end?

I had already pitched the show by the time I met her, and had pretty much broken the season. Before I went to Texas to meet her, I was like, “You don’t have to tell her anything.” Then we became best friends in two seconds. We were at her sister’s house on the lake and I was like, “Oh, fuck it. I’m just going to do it.” I was like, “May, I have to tell you. I kind of know everything that I want to happen, and a lot of it is really different than the book.” She was like, “I want to hear!” I loosely pitched it to her and she was like, “It’s brilliant. I love it. Do whatever you want. I wish you’d been there when I was writing the book!” She was so sweet and supportive, and wasn’t precious about it. What I’m so stoked about is that the book is doing so well now on Amazon. People who love the show are buying the book and reading it and they love it too, and they’re very different. Everyone’s happy.

Writers have done crazier things, but of course you couldn’t kill Margo off. Did you make that change to keep the surprise element and also give you more runway to keep telling this story?

Yeah, it was both. When I was reading the book, there’s a period of time where Sophie is infatuated with Margo and at the same time, she thinks that Margot is framing her for the murder of Abby [the high school victim played by Madison Wolfe in the show]. And the reader is also thinking Margo is framing her. I love doing two things at once. I love a toxic love affair where it’s like, “We’re fucking, but maybe you’re framing me for murder.” That’s my wheelhouse. So, that’s what I want to do and what I wanted the whole season to be. How do I do that? When Margo dies in the book, you realize she wasn’t framing Sophie. I was like, “How do I keep that tension up all the way until the end of the show?” So that was really the impetus for the change and not wanting to kill that character. But it wasn’t really so much about how many seasons. I just thought it was more delicious that way.

Does that mean you’ll keep that tension for this entire Margo-Sophie relationship? We’ll always be questioning true motives?

That’s definitely part of it. Margo is a classic femme fatal, so you’re always going to question exactly what’s going on, and it will always be a crime story. There will always be plot twists that are going to surprise. If I do my job right, the idea is to always have a lot going on that is surprising and unexpected and hopefully really satisfying. And that’s between them and in their relationship, but also in the things they do separately and in the way they both have to navigate their new lives after everything that’s now happened.

Are you thinking you would pick up right where you left off or would you do a time jump for a season two?

I think a little time jump. I like there to be a little bit of a new status quo, but you don’t want to miss too much.

The ending sets them up to either be against each other — either overtly or deceitfully — or it could bind them since they’re really all each other has now. What do you want us to think — will we get more Margo and Sophie in season two?

You are good at trying to get me to spill! I mean, they’re the two leads of the show, of course you’re getting more Sophie and Margo. Just, what does that mean? And where does it end up? I’m not going to tell you! But they will have many scenes together. I can say that.

Sophie threw away everything in the finale, which was kind of astounding but also heartbreaking that she would come so full circle in her spiral. What were you wanting to say and explore about trauma and recovery?

Well, I’m sober for a long time. Hightown was a lot about addiction and recovery. I really didn’t want to do that again. Obviously, in Hunting Wives they drink a lot, and it’s not good. It’s not helping them make good decisions, especially for Sophie. But I was hoping not to get into the weeds of a 12-step story again, only because I’ve done it. So to me, Sophie drinking and driving again was probably the soapiest thing in the whole show, in terms of: “This is a little bit ridiculous, but I think we can get away with it.” And I’m not 100 percent sure we did! Because a lot of people were like, “But the Tesla has a camera.” I’m like, “OK, I hear you! But this is the story. You enjoyed the whole thing, just go with it!” (Laughs.) My husband goes, “Couldn’t she just throw the [alcohol] bottles out the window?” But then you wouldn’t have that final shot.

Are there any season two ideas that aren’t spoilery that you would share? Maybe in terms of expanding the show or bringing in different characters?

Well, there is no season two, yet.

Hypothetically.

I love the response to Wanda Salazar [played by Karen Rodriguez], who’s our deputy. She is a very interesting and very fresh character, so I always want to make sure she has plenty to do. I definitely think that more trouble will come from the bowels of Alba, Texas, which is Margo and [her brother played by Michael Aaron Milligan] Kyle’s hometown. Obviously Jed’s campaign [for governor] brings in another class of people. There was also talk of a reality show for Callie and John [played by Jaime Ray Newman and Branton Box, respectively]. So there’s a lot of world building that can be done.

And now the tone of the show is set; you can’t go back. So, no notes from Netflix for season two?

From your lips to God’s ears!

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The Hunting Wives is now streaming all eight episodes on Netflix.