Whether it was being asked to kiss someone they found repugnant or simply being unable
to share a set, let alone a scene, these stars downright refused to touch one another. Fortunately,
the stories behind these feuds can be even more interesting than the projects themselves.
Alyson Hannigan and Jason Segel played a couple on How I Met Your Mother for nine seasons.
In that time, their characters, Lily and Marshall, were an example of a partnership everyone
could aspire to. However, Hannigan had to put her foot down when it came to kissing
Segel.
While there was no apparent animosity between them, the former Buffy the Vampire Slayer
actress revealed she simply couldn't stand the fact that her on-screen husband was a
smoker in real life. She told Digital Spy in 2008:
"I cannot stand cigarette smoke. It's like kissing an ashtray, and he's trying to be
polite by having gum or mints, but it doesn't help."
"I mean, God. Not only is that a filthy habit, but also. Can I bum one?"
However, Hannigan was totally eager to help Segel kick his nasty habit. As she explained:
"When we started the pilot [for the show] he was like, 'Get me to stop smoking, I'll
be your best friend.' So we did this bet where he would owe me $10 every time he had a cigarette.
After the first day, he owed me $200."
Being in debt to his co-star got Segel to quit cold turkey...for a while. According
to Hannigan, once Segel started getting, quote, "stressed out," he began lighting up again.
It's unclear how the duo got over Hannigan's repulsion for the remainder of the series,
but it's possible they kissed a lot less than the writers were originally intending. Fortunately,
the actors remained on friendly terms despite their nicotine dust-up.
Hollywood is full of rumors, and one of the wildest dates back to the early '90s, when
Tupac Shakur and Janet Jackson were filming the romantic drama Poetic Justice. As the
rumor goes, Jackson refused to kiss her co-star unless he agreed to get an AIDS test. The
"Keep Ya Head Up" rapper reportedly refused, telling The Source that he took the request
as a, quote, "insult."
Throughout the years, both stars have touched on the subject, with Shakur saying at times
that it was absolutely true. However, in a 2019 interview with The Daily Beast, late
director John Singleton explained the whole thing was supposed to be funny, although Tupac
might've missed the joke. He said:
"We're on the set joking, with Janet there and the whole cast, and I was like, 'I don't
know if I want you kissing my actresses, I don't know where your lips have been'...And
it became a joke. And then a joke turned into some publicity, and [Tupac] was the only one
that was left out of the circle."
While Singleton later claimed Tupac was in on the joke, the rumor still lingers, with
the truth maybe somewhere in the middle.
To this day, Denzel Washington and Julia Roberts call each other dear friends after starring
in the 1993 drama The Pelican Brief. However, it's said that Washington turned down a steamy
love scene between the two of them, as he's reportedly very conscious about how his fans
react to him in interracial scenes.
According to Newsweek, Washington turned down the scene out of loyalty to his female African-American
fans. The star reportedly soured to the idea of interracial love scenes after an on-screen
kiss between him and Mimi Rogers drew loud boos from black women in a test screening
audience for the 1989 film The Mighty Quinn.
"I better go."
Washington said:
"Black women are not often seen as objects of desire on film. They have always been my
core audience."
Roberts confirmed that it was Washington's idea to cut the scene, although she's sorry
she missed out on the opportunity, saying:
"Don't I have a pulse? Of course I wanted to kiss Denzel. It was his idea to take the
damn scenes out."
Charlie Sheen is well-known as one of Hollywood's most notorious party boys, and that's why
Lindsay Lohan was reportedly skeptical about kissing him multiple times while filming the
2013 comedy Scary Movie 5. According to a report from TMZ, Lohan was asked to kiss the
actor three times in one scene, and she simply couldn't do it. Although she's a notoriously
avid party person herself, Lohan was allegedly afraid of Sheen's spotty history. In other
words, she thought she might catch something from Sheen if she kissed him.
Lohan allegedly asked for the script to be changed, but it wasn't until the day of shooting
that a body double was brought in for some of the work. Ultimately, the two seemed to
get along okay. In fact, Lohan agreed to a guest appearance on Sheen's short-lived sitcom
Anger Management in a plot line that ended with the two of them in bed together.
In 1994, audiences got to see Julia Roberts star with Nick Nolte in I Love Trouble, but
the rumors about the love lost between these two actors are notorious. It's a classic example
of on-set friction, and allegedly, the duo refused to even be on the same set together,
let alone touch one another.
"Thank you for the mutt, he's been quite an addition to my life."
"Well you're very welcome, I hope you named him after me."
"I certainly did. Yeah, I've grown real attached to little Dick."
According to a report from the Los Angeles Times, Roberts was irritated by Nolte's machismo
on set. And he was reportedly so annoyed by her attitude that he would heighten his machismo
around her just to wind her up a bit. By the end of the film, it's said the duo couldn't
even be on set together without tempers flaring, forcing producers to use body doubles for
most scenes.
If that sounds like the kind of thing that would lead to a bad movie, that's because
it is. A lot of the critiques at the time had to do with the lack of chemistry between
the two stars, as well as slew of other behind-the-scenes gripes. Roberts admitted that Nolte can be,
quote, "completely charming and very nice." However, she also claimed that he was, quote,
"completely disgusting." As the actress put it:
"He's going to hate me for saying this, but he seems to go out of his way to repel people."
As for Nolte, the actor responded to Robert's statement, saying:
"It's not nice to call someone 'disgusting.' But she's not a nice person. Everyone knows
that."
It's no wonder these two actors had no desire to touch each other. Chances are, they might've
killed one another.
Game of Thrones fans may be surprised to learn that the characters Cersei Lannister and Ser
Bronn of the Blackwater never actually appeared together, despite their characters almost
exclusively showing up alongside Jaime and Tyrion Lannister. And the reason behind that
has to do with broken hearts.
Long before heading to Westeros, Lena Headey and Jerome Flynn appeared in the early '90s
series Soldier, Soldier, and they were linked romantically in the early 2000s. But according
to a 2014 report in The Telegraph, a source claims that Headey and Flynn had a very real
breakup that left them no longer on speaking terms.
Headey reportedly asked the producers to carefully orchestrate it so they never had to share
a set at the same time. The conflict was artfully handled for the most part, with a few glimpses
of drama here and there, such as the season seven meeting in King's Landing when Bronn
offhandedly says he'd rather go have a drink than be present for the biggest political
discussion the realm had ever seen.
"Let's you and me go have a drink, while the fancy folks talk. Eh?"
Sadly, it's unclear what exactly happened to make the breakup so tumultuous, as The
Sun reports both stars kept it under wraps, and no one from the show nor HBO has ever
commented on it. Now that the series is all wrapped up and their characters are in no
danger of sharing the screen together, curious fans may never know what caused the couple
to fall apart.
While Dwayne Johnson and Vin Diesel weren't asked to touch each other often during the
Fast and the Furious franchise, fans likely won't be seeing a rematch of their epic throwdown
from Fast Five, which saw the two hulking figures fight each other through literal concrete
walls.
After the Rock made his debut in the fifth installment of the Vin Diesel-led series,
things reportedly turned sour off-screen. While filming The Fate of the Furious, Johnson
posted a cryptic message on Instagram that he later deleted, in which fans assumed he
was calling out Diesel. However, things got official when he confirmed to Rolling Stone
that he and Diesel had friction on set. He said:
"Vin and I had a few discussions, including an important face-to-face in my trailer. And
what I came to realize is that we have a fundamental difference in philosophies on how we approach
moviemaking and collaborating. It took me some time, but I'm grateful for that clarity.
Whether we work together again or not."
Johnson later confirmed that he and Diesel didn't shoot any scenes together in the eighth
installment of the franchise. In fact, when the movie came out, it was clear that the
former wrestler was kept far away from Diesel's character.
Johnson went on to star in his own spinoff to the franchise, Hobbs & Shaw, borrowing
two characters from Diesel's Fast and Furious franchise that are specifically not Dominic
Toretto.
"I'm not working with this guy, I've been there, done that."
Martin Lawrence and Tisha Campbell might've played a married couple on the sitcom Martin,
but things turned bad in a hurry thanks to some behind-the-scenes drama. Campbell reportedly
walked off the set and quit the Fox sitcom after hearing stories that Lawrence allegedly
threatened and abused his wife and their child.
People reported that when producers tried to sue for her to get back to work, she countersued
them, charging Lawrence with, quote, "repeated and escalating sexual harassment, sexual battery,
verbal abuse, and related threats."
Both sides in the lawsuit reportedly settled out of court. However, their days of playing
husband and wife together were over. Campbell agreed to come back to work and finish out
the last season of the series, but would reportedly only do so if it was arranged that Lawrence
would never be on the set with her at the same time. Marriages are tough, but it seems
that TV marriages might be even tougher.
Sometimes actors feud, and other times, they're made uncomfortable by their co-stars. However,
when it comes to Neal McDonough refusing to film a love scene with actress Virginia Madsen
on the ABC series Scoundrels, religion is to blame.
"No, I couldn't do it."
McDonough was reportedly fired after just days of filming, and Deadline notes that what
was once called a, quote, "casting change" was the result of McDonough, who is a Catholic
and married to model Ruve Robertson, refusing to film love scenes or even kissing scenes
in any film or TV role. In fact, ABC should've known better as McDonough's beliefs were the
cause of friction during his stint on Desperate Housewives. McDonough told the Christian Examiner
in 2016:
"Killing people on-screen, that's fake. When you're in bed with another woman on-screen,
guess what? That's real. I don't like that kind of stuff. Especially now with kids, I
don't want to have my kids say, 'Hey, Dad, what are you doing with that lady on screen?'"
The star often discusses how his beliefs have cost him roles and work in Hollywood. In fact,
sticking to his principles on the set of Scoundrels reportedly cost him a $1 million payday. As
for whether or not it's worth it, it seems the star still keeps to his rules today.
It's always great for a TV show when art imitates life, and the actors behind a pair of characters
get romantically involved in real life. This was the case for Gossip Girl stars Penn Badgley
and Blake Lively. The couple dated on the show, and they eventually got together in
the real world before Lively married her Green Lantern co-star, Ryan Reynolds, in 2012.
Around the time Badgley and Lively broke up, their characters parted ways with each other
as well, prompting many fans to believe that their off-screen chemistry, which informed
so much of the heat between their characters, was gone now that they were no longer smooching
in real life.
Badgley kind of confirmed the news during an appearance on Watch What Happens Live,
when the actor was asked about his best and worst on-screen kiss.
"Best, I'll say was Blake, because we actually had a relationship at the time."
"Right."
"And then worst, maybe Blake after we broke up."
It turns out the stars were still keeping their private lives private for a while before
they informed the cast and crew they were no longer together. It's unclear how the minds
behind the show reacted, but with the chemistry gone and things awkward for everyone, it's
rumored the duo decided it was time for their character to cease touching altogether.
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