Kevin Costner claims royal family 'turned on him' as Princess Diana agreed to appear in 'The Bodyguard 2'
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: 'Yellowstone' star Kevin Costner recently revealed that he had an "ugly" conflict with the royal family as they "turned on him" when Princess Diana allegedly was in talks to appear in 'The Bodyguard' sequel shortly before her untimely death in 1997.
The Oscar-winning actor stated that there was doubt within the royal family regarding Diana's purported consent to feature in the sequel to the 1992 movie, which initially starred Costner and Whitney Houston.
Kevin Costner had 'ugly' feud with the royal family
In an interview on 'The Howard Stern Show' on Tuesday, June 18, Costner, 69, disclosed that a follow-up to his popular 1992 film 'The Bodyguard' starring Whitney Houston was being developed, with Princess Diana slated to act alongside him.
However, the project was shelved due to Diana's death in the summer of 1997. Eventually, Costner came under fire from the royal family, who did not think the late princess would agree to star in a Hollywood production.
"When Diana passed, about a year later it had leaked out that I was prepping 'Bodyguard 2' with her. And what happened was, the royal family kind of turned on me a little bit," Costner revealed.
The 'Yellowstone' star added, "Like, 'No, that's not true.' And it got actually kind of ugly. And I let it go for a while. It just got uglier and uglier," the Daily Mail reported.
Costner further revealed that he eventually got in touch with Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York, who was the one who initially linked Costner and Diana together, and pleaded for her assistance.
He stated, "Finally I called up Sarah, and said, 'Sarah, you need to tell me who is leading the charge there on this thing. She goes, 'No, no, no, Kev, you don't want to talk to them.' I said, 'Yes I do.'"
"I called them up and I said, 'I'm telling you something, you need to stop because it is true. And if you don't stop, I'm gonna start.' Because it was," Costner continued.
Kevin Costner described how he persuaded Princess Diana to appear in his movie
When Costner tried to film 'The Bodyguard 2', Diana was estranged from her ex-husband Prince Charles—now King Charles—and alienated from the royal family headed by the late Queen Elizabeth II.
Costner recounted on the 'Howard Stern Show', "What had happened was, I started talking to her through Sarah, and I said, 'Look, I'm gonna do 'Bodyguard 2′ and I think I can build this around you. Would you be interested?'"
"And she goes, 'Yes. My life's about to change.' I didn't really go into depth with it, but I thought I understood what she was saying," he said.
The 'Bodyguard' star continued, "She was very sweet and we talked. The second time we talked she said, 'Is there going to be a kissing scene?' I said, 'Do you want there to be one?'"
"She said, 'Yeah,' and I said, 'Then we'll do that.' I wasn't going to make the full romance about her. But there was going to be a moment that we did. And she was so sweet about this."
Costner decided not to proceed with the 'The Bodyguard' sequel after Diana, then 36, died in a car accident in Paris in August 1997. He remarked, "I could not replace Princess Di."
In 2012, Costner initially discussed the details of 'The Bodyguard', stating that the story would go into Diana's complex relationship with the press, The Guardian reported.
Paradoxically, Diana lost her life attempting to escape the paparazzi who were pursuing her that evening through the streets of Paris.
