Kevin Costner Is Done Being Polite About His 'Yellowstone' Contract & He's Spilling the Tea
Kevin Costner’s exit from Yellowstone was a hot topic last summer and there were plenty of rumors about his demands for more money and creative control. The 69-year-old actor is now ready to set the record straight because he claims that the public narrative is much different than what happened behind the scenes.
Costner revealed his version of events to Deadline, noting that he hadn’t “felt good” about the headlines because they weren’t “truthful.” Here’s how he explained the contract situation: “I made a contract for seasons five, six, and seven. In February, after a two- or three-month negotiation, they made another contract. They wanted to redo that one, and instead of seasons six and seven, it was 5A and 5B, and maybe we’ll do six. They weren’t able to make those. Horizon was set in the middle, but Yellowstone was first position. I fit [Horizon] into the gaps. They just kept moving their gaps.”
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The Oscar-winning director is pointing out that it was a scheduling issue that made it impossible for him to shoot two parts of his upcoming film, Horizon: An American Saga, and Yellowstone at the same time. Creator Taylor Sheridan hadn’t finished the necessary scripts for Season 5, so the timing became a crucial issue in their contract negotiations. Costner alleged that he was trying to be generous with his time when Yellowstone suffered some production setbacks. They didn’t have scripts for the back half of the fifth season and that’s when the calendar fell apart. That’s also when the rumors took off and the Dances With Wolves star’s reputation took a hit.
“A source on their side spun that into, well, he only wants to work a week for a whole season. Do you think that’s who I am? I’ve never missed a day of work,” Costner continued. “I’ve never left before fulfilling my contractual obligations. A lot of times, I stay as much as I can. In fact, I worked the nine-day stretch just to try to help them in July, when I was starting [Horizon] August 1.” He also hinted that Sheridan’s huge workload as a creator for multiple shows, including Mayor of Kingstown and Tulsa King, hindered the process. “They weren’t ready to do anything with them because the scripts weren’t there,” he added. There’s a lot of product they were putting out.”
In the end, Costner was upset that Yellowstone producers and the network, Paramount+, didn’t “stick up” for him. “I went and sold this thing for you. I was going to only do one season. I made it for three. I fulfilled three. So, I went from one to three, then I did a fourth one for them and they wanted to do three more. So, I made the contract to do that. They imploded,” Costner said. “It all happened because they shut down one whole season, didn’t tell anybody and I didn’t work for 14 months.” Despite Costner’s obvious dissatisfaction with how he was treated, he said he’s “very open to coming back.” Now, the ball is in Sheridan’s court.
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