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New binge-worthy show 'Godless' debuts on Netflix this week

The western stars Jeff Daniels and starts streaming Nov. 22.
Jeff Daniels talks to entertainment reporter Kim Holcomb about his new Netflix original show Godless.

Set in the dusty plains of New Mexico, Godless is Netflix's first venture into westerns.

It's also the first western of Jeff Daniels' long career.

He stars as brazen, unhinged outlaw Frank Griffin who, by Daniels' estimate, suffers from about a dozen mental conditions. But he said he didn't try to diagnose them.

"It was more enjoyable to kind of chase his crazy brain and go with whatever he was thinking, knowing that he needed a team of therapists - and this was the 1880's when they didn't have therapists on every corner," Daniels said. "This is what mental dysfunction looks like, unattended."

Shot on location in Santa Fe, the series looks authentic because it was - from the dust and wind to the horseback riding injuries.

"My wife broke her arm," actor Scoot McNairy said. His wife, Whitney Able, also plays his character's wife on the show.

"She was running and her hat fell out and the horse saw it and jumped to the left and she went straight off," he continued. "Snapped her rotator cuff. And she had to get back on the horse.... She's a rockstar, a total rockstar."

Daniels also fell off a horse and broke his wrist.

"You know you're on a western when they say 'action' and the ambulance starts its engine," he said.

Godless is a true western - isolated, violent, and at times romantic. It starts streaming on Netflix Nov. 22 at 12:01 am.

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