Hold on to your Stetsons – Yellowstone might be over but the drama is still spilling from the screen to real life!
In a damning takedown, the show’s lead and executive producer Kevin Costner,70, has been labelled “impossible” to work with by insiders speaking to The Hollywood Reporter as they spill on his diva-like behaviour on set.
According to the publication’s sources, the actor got into a brawl with co-star Wes Bentley, who plays Jamie Dutton, and even “lunged” at him at one point, leaving their castmate Kelly Reilly, who plays Beth Dutton, “in tears” after they disagreed over the way a scene should play out.
Kevin’s way or the highway
Kevin, who has a rumoured reputation for ignoring directors and insisting on doing things his way, was allegedly telling Wes, 47, to ditch co-creator Taylor Sheridan’s script and play the scene the way he wanted, but Wes refused, telling Costner “he had signed up for a Taylor Sheridan show, not a Kevin Costner production”.
“Kevin didn’t like that, and he lunged at him,” alleges 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.”
It isn’t the first time claims of tension between Kevin and the cast and crew of Yellowstone have surfaced.
In December 2024, Luke Grimes admitted to Esquire that Costner’s absence from the second half of season 5 made filming a lot easier – amid speculation that Kevin might leave the show.
“To be really honest, there was a part of Kevin being gone that meant some of the conflict was gone,” Luke explained. “Not pointing any fingers, but it was actually the easiest season we’ve filmed.”
And according to The Hollywood Reporter, Kevin’s behaviour on Yellowstone follows earlier claims that Costner has been known to clash with co-stars, rewrite scripts himself, and fail to follow direction.
Feuds and fallouts
“There’s a long list of people in Hollywood who swear they’ll never work with Costner again,” the outlet claims, listing clashes with Clint Eastwood on set of 1993 crime thriller A Perfect World, Kurt Russell on the set of 3000 Miles to Graceland and his decision to sue his longtime producing partner Jim Wilsonfor $15 million in 2021 over a dispute involving Good Ones Production, the company he and Wilson formed in the 1990s.
Kevin’s former agent Rick Nicita, who represented him from 2002 to 2008, however, hit back at claims of his former client being challenging.
“The word difficult gets used a lot,” Rick explained to THR. “It can mean someone who won’t come out of their trailer, or someone who doesn’t know their lines, or is rude. That’s not Kevin.”
Box office bombs and hits
He continued: “He wanted what he wanted and knew what he wanted and if he didn’t get it … well, he was never a great compromiser. It’s a firm belief in himself and a confidence that to some can play as arrogance.”
Meanwhile, Kevin’s gambles on movies are no secret with some paying off better than others. Waterworld has long been held up as one of Hollywood’s biggest ever box office bombs and is regarded as having sunk Kevin’s career at the time, while his punts on Dance With Wolves, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, and The Bodyguard, will go down in film history as true screen icons.
But insider says Kevin’s obsession with his latest project, the four-part film series Horizon: An American Saga, a $200 million project to which Kevin has contributed $38 million out of his own pocket, alongside his recent costly divorce has the possibility of sinking him and his finances once again.
