The first season of the 10-episode “Mayor of Kingstown” streaming series from Paramount+ debuted on November 14, 2021. The main characters of the show are Mike McLusky (Jeremy Renner) and his family, who run a criminal operation in the fictional Michigan town of Kingstown, which is most known for its extensive jail system. At the beginning of the series, Mike mostly acts as Mitch’s right-hand man, but he soon finds himself in command and assumes the title of “mayor” of the family’s murky business, which mediates disputes between those who are imprisoned and owners of the prisons in town.
Although “Mayor of Kingstown” has received mixed reviews from critics, its 89 percent Audience Score on Rotten Tomatoes shows that showrunners Taylor Sheridan and Hugh Dillon have produced another strong film for Paramount+. Additionally, Sheridan and Dillon work together on the Paramount Network television programme “Yellowstone,” which Sheridan produced and in which Dillon has a recurring role. TV Insider claims that the creators of “Kingstown” came up with the concept ten years ago, before Sheridan became well-known for penning the screenplays for blockbusters like “Sicario” (2015) and “Hell or High Water” (2016).
Given the prison-town setting and “Mayor of Kingstown’s” themes of mass imprisonment, systematic racism, and corruption, viewers may be curious as to how accurate the fictional town of Kingstown is to actual towns. So, is there any relation between Kingstown and a genuine city?
Kingstown is based on co-creator Hugh Dillon’s hometown
The fictional Michigan city of Kingstown where the events of “Mayor of Kingstown” take place is really located north of the border in Canada. Co-creator of the series Matt Dillon grew up in Kingston, Ontario, which now has seven jails but once had as many as ten (via the Kingston Herald). The Kingston Penitentiary, one of these facilities, was established in 1835 and operated as the country’s first prison until it was shut down and designated a historic landmark in 1990 (by Canada’s Historic Places).
The Kingston region developed into a well-liked prison location, claims Canada’s Penitentiary Museum, simply because Ontario is the nation’s most densely populated province, which results in a naturally greater incarceration rate. In an interview, Dillon said, “Growing up in a setting like that does something to you.
The option to substitute Kingston for the show’s made-up location was seized by the television production. The Kingston Penitentiary and the city of Kingston were the locations for the summer 2021 filming of “Mayor of Kingstown,” according to CTV News. Kingston had already served as a real-life jail town, but with the exposure Dillon and Sheridan’s show has given it, perhaps it can become a small piece of Hollywood up in Canada. Netflix and Amazon Prime have both used the area as a shooting location in recent years (via CTV News).
