Larry McMurtry is the author of the book Lonesome Dove, which was published in June 1985. The book spent 20 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and received the 1985 Pulitzer Prize, the Texas Institute of Letters Jesse Jones Award for Best Fictional Book, and the Spin Award for Best Western Novel of 1985. Originally, McMurtry and Peter Bogdanovich wrote the film version of Lonesome Dove as a movie entitled The Streets of Laredo in 1972, with thoughts of casting John Wayne, James Stewart, and Henry Fonda. When the project failed, McMurtry turned it into a novel. Motown Productions acquired the film rights to the book during a meeting between McMurtry and Motown Productions president Suzanne de Passe.

Motown Productions and CBS Television partnered to air the story as an eight-hour miniseries in four episodes. Bill Witliff wrote the teleplay and served as executive producer. The miniseries was filmed in Austin, Del Rio, Texas, and Santa Fe, New Mexico, from March to July 1988. Finally, the movie version aired on CBS in February 1989, starring Robert Duvall, Tommy Lee Jones, Danny Glover, Anjelica Houston, and Diane Lane. The miniseries and the movie were both successful.

Source: Lonesome Dove Television Miniseries Archive at the Southwestern Writers Collection, Texas State University-San Marcos.