Kevin Costner is The Hollywood Reporter’s latest cover story and I’m pretty sure he is not happy about it. Here’s the title: How Kevin Costner Lost Hollywood; On-set brawls. Courtroom battles. Epic bombs. Why the world’s most bankable cowboy is suddenly shooting blanks. Da-YUM! Like a great Western vista, the piece is sprawling, tracking the peaks and valleys of Costner’s career while bringing to light what many working in the industry have known for years — that he’s an uncompromising diva. The article almost makes the case that his big success with Dances With Wolves bred an unreasonable confidence/arrogance in Costner, hence his delusional refusal to let go of his Horizon saga. The profile covers a lot of territory, including new Yellowstone tea about a fight with costar Wes Bentley. That story, plus some other highlights
Riot on set: They were filming on a soundstage in Utah — Kevin Costner, Wes Bentley and Kelly Reilly — playing out another tense exchange in the Dutton family drama Yellowstone. But between takes, tensions boiled over. Costner, both star and executive producer, was pushing Bentley to ditch Taylor Sheridan’s script and play the moment his way. Bentley refused. He told Costner that he had signed up for a Taylor Sheridan show, not a Kevin Costner production. “Kevin didn’t like that, and he lunged at him,” says a source who was present. “No fists were thrown, but they were in each other’s faces, pushing and shoving and just getting hot until they had to be separated.” Reilly, according to one witness, was in tears. Production briefly shut down. The dust-up — previously unreported — was a tipping point on a set already cracking from creative power struggles and bruised egos.
Sheridan backed Bentley: “The incident with Wes was the line in the sand. Everything was different after that,” says another source who was also present for the fight with Bentley. “Everyone loved Wes and so that really made Taylor upset. Kevin and Taylor butted heads from there on out. It got very awkward.”
1883 made Costner jealous: Around the same time, Costner had been circulating the script for the first installment for his own ambitious Horizon vision, a project he had been pitching around town since way back in 1988. This was Costner’s white whale, a $200 million Western that made Dances With Wolves look like a Sundance indie. Costner’s epic would be not one, not two, but four films set in the post-Civil War American West, spanning a 12-year period. The problem was that no one wanted it. “Nobody was jumping to buy [Costner’s] odyssey and after 1883, he wanted to prove everyone wrong,” says a source. “He was obsessively pursuing it and as a result his world on Yellowstone starts unravelling.”
Cattle call: Still, there’s clearly some lingering bad blood between the two old cowboys. According to one well-placed source, Costner had a hard time finding horses and cows to rent during his Horizon shoot in Utah. The rumor on the set was that most of the livestock had already been rented … by Taylor Sheridan.
Saudi, can you spare a dime? Last year, Costner made a trek to Riyadh looking for those rich guys — and to accept a lifetime achievement award at Saudi Arabia’s Joy Awards. “Saudi Arabia deserves its place on the world stage, and I urge you to tell your own stories,” he said during his acceptance speech. … While in Riyadh Costner met with top Saudi officials and pitched them to help finance the third and fourth installments of Horizon. According to two sources, the Saudis were open to investing a certain amount in the franchise, but not the sum that Costner was seeking. He ultimately walked away with nothing.
Available for booking: This year alone, he gave paid speeches at the International Dairy Deli Bakery Association; Impact Bucharest, which is a conference for entrepreneurs; and a keynote address at VMX 2025, the world’s largest veterinary conference.
“The International Dairy Deli Bakery Association.” You guys, I’m cackling! Please tell me there was a line in his speech like “If you yeast ’em, they will bun.” I’d feel badly for someone having to hit the road to earn some scratch in what should be a relaxing time of life… except Kevin completely did this to himself! This fakakta Horizon obsession is a stupid, expensive folly, and apparently is being egged on by a former Price Waterhouse accountant friend exerting a Svengali-esque influence over Kevin and who also occasionally acts as Kevin’s lawyer. (And I don’t mean in a movie.) Anyway, there’s so much more in the full profile and it’s definitely worth a read. It’s lengthy, but CB and I each inhaled it. The anecdote of Sheridan renting out all the horses and cows in Utah is so fantastically petty, I hope it shows up on The Studio.
Photos credit: FayesVision/Wenn/Avalon, Jerry Perez/Avalon, Darla Khazei/INSTARimages, Avalon.red
Ah, yes, another entitled rich white guy throwing a tantrum when his unearned demands aren’t met. Tale as old as time — but definitely more prevalent today.
And let’s be clear: Costner was ALWAYS the weakest link in his movies, even the good ones.
KC has learned nothing over the years. He pulled these shenanigans on Robinhood and Waterworld – both made worse by his pettiness.
I had never enjoyed his acting but when The Bodyguard came out I thought I was wrong. After rewatching it, I just liked seeing Whitney Houston and didn’t care about the rest.
I’ll watch Prince Of Thieves for Morgan Freeman, Alan Rickman and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio any day all day. And a wee bit Christian Slater. Don’t care much for the dude in the titular role.
I LOVE that movie. He was laughable in it. Alan Rickman, on the other hand, was sexy-evil and hilarious.
Hee. A critic noted that Costner was “Robin Hood of Pacific Coast Highway.” Agreed…😂😂
I still wish his ex had gotten fu money from him but I hope she’s enjoying her new man’s money and cackling about this in her louboutins!
Wes Bentley was my favorite actor on Yellowstone. It’s a shame he got caught in the crossfire of a battle of massive egos. I’m no Sheridan apologist and I thought the last couple of seasons of Yellowstone were a joke, but he was the writer and director. Costner needs to get over himself. He’s such a wooden actor.
The only movie I’ve ever liked him in is Bull Durham (and I do LOVE that movie) so this feels like poetic justice. However – if anyone else (that was more generally liked) was doing everything they could (paid appearances at weird conferences and trade shows) to fund their passion project, most of us would probably congratulate them on being a real go-getter prepared to do whatever it took…
Myself, I liked Costner in Bull Durham, too. Waterworld, Conan the Barbarian and a movie I can’t even remember were the only 3 movies I’ve ever walked out on. SOOOOOOOO bad.