Paramount Network is in the midst of bringing 1883’s ten-episode season to a big audience pool, in part due to the lack of new Yellowstone universe content. In an ideal world, we’d be spending part of the summer watching Kevin Costner’s John Dutton inspiring Jamie’s flop sweat in new episodes, but the actor has long been rumored to be the reason why things went haywire behind the scenes earlier this year. And now it looks like his ex Christine Baumgartner specifically called the actor out in court paperwork by saying he could have easily stuck around the top of Yellowstone’s call sheet if he wasn’t such a “money-focused person.”
Ever since the rumor mill exploded back in February, essentially the only times Costner has actually said the world “yellowstone” was tied entirely to his band’s album title, and he has essentially stopped addressing the show publicly. It initially seemed like that might have been because the Dances with Wolves filmmaker had been major slighted in some way, but here’s how his ex-wife called him out in a declaration filed in July 2023 (via Insider):
Kevin's value as an actor has never been higher, especially after the success of Yellowstone. Kevin could have continued with the show, but he chose not to in order to pursue the Horizon project.
Baumgartner, who is the mother of the former couple’s three children, didn’t exactly peg everything to Costner’s undying love of cinema or his passion for telling the story at the heart of Horizon. Rather, she tied that all into the actor being driven by financial goals, and said the reason why he left Yellowstone in the dust was because he felt his own Western film series would ”increase his earnings exponentially.” (The handbag designer herself had previously been blamed for alllegedly forcing him to leave the show.)
While those statements may be completely on the level and authentic to Christine Baumgartner’s experiences, one can easily still question the sensibility there. Clearly, Costner is indeed excited about unleashing his four-part saga Horizon, for which he reunited with Yellowstone vets like Danny Huston and Will Patton. And it does seem pretty clear that filming schedules for that project are a big part of why he reportedly wanted a more limited role for John in Season 5. After all, while Costner may have had huge TV success in the past with limited series like Hatfields & McCoys, he’s still very much a movies-minded person at heart, and his filmmaker tendencies probably won’t ever go away completely. (Just look at how often he’ll post about loving his career these days without mentioning Yellowstone at all.)
But it's the claims about his obsessions with money that seem slightly off, specifically when it comes to trading off those two projects. So many divorce details have centered on Baumgartner's attempts to get more money for child support, which essentially made their financial records public, and caused Costner to severely cut back her credit card limits. And we know that he brought a prenup agreement into this marriage given the massive payoff that accompanied his first divorce many years ago. So he obviously has no interest in being completely broke.
However, he previously talked about how he has put many, many millions of dollars into bringing Horizon to life, making it as much of a risk as it is a passion project for the Emmy winner. Given the state of box office support for features that aren't full-on blockbusters, it's not easy to be blindly confident about Costner riding this four-part western drama all the way to the bank and back again.
Plus, he was making more than $1 million an episode for Yellowstone's fifrth season. And while that may not be on the same level as a big feature payday, it's guaranteed money for portraying a character that means a lot to Costner, even if he may not want to play the role that much anymore. Perhaps some Paramount Network exec wanted the actor to take a paycut, or maybe Taylor Sheridan was tired of Costner's gripes and wrote something into the fifth season that Costner did not want to go forward with. Until more details come out, it's hard to know where things lie.
Fans can stream past Yellowstone episodes with a Peacock subscription while waiting to see what will happen next for Costner and his fictional Dutton family, as well as his real-life family.
