Kevin Costner Could Have Directed Clint Eastwood’s Most Acclaimed Western (& It Would’ve Beat Their Eventual Team-Up)

Kevin Costner desperately wanted to direct Clint Eastwood’s most acclaimed Western, which overshadowed their eventual movie collaboration. The careers of Clint Eastwood and Kevin Costner have interesting parallels, with the two having their movie breakthroughs thanks to a Western. Eastwood had the groundbreaking Dollars movie trilogy, while Costner stole the show in 1985’s Silverado. Eastwood later used his star power to move into directing too, which is something Costner would do also, beginning with the acclaimed Dances with Wolves.

Eastwood is indelibly linked to the genre now, and while Costner’s Western movie output is much smaller, he has become something of a Western icon too. Costner is gambling big (in more ways than one) with his upcoming Horizon movie series. The star and director has invested some of his own fortune into the duology and plans to shoot two more entries to complete the story. Time will tell if his risk pays off, but it’s notable that pretty much every film he’s directed – including The Postman – is a Western of some kind.

Kevin Costner Chased Unforgiven As A Directing Project For Years

Clint Eastwood won the Best Director Oscar for his work in Unforgiven

Costner’s Dances with Wolves helped revive Westerns in the 1990s after the genre had stagnated for over a decade. It likely helped push Eastwood to finally make Unforgiven, which was a screenplay he sat on for years after acquiring it. The original script was penned during the late 1970s, with the likes of Francis Ford Coppola considering directing Unforgiven with John Malkovich in the lead. Costner revealed in a 2004 chat with EW that he once ”… chased Unforgiven as a director for six years,” and had little concern about its bleak subject matter.

A version of Unforgiven directed by – and possibly starring – Costner is a curious “what if” scenario, but it all worked out. In truth, Eastwood was always the best choice, since he is a legend of the genre. The movie’s deconstruction of the myth of the Old West is all the more powerful because Eastwood is playing the lead role.

Costner Is The Reason Morgan Freeman Starred In Unforgiven

Costner recommended Unforgiven to his Robin Hood co-star

Morgan Freeman experienced movie star fame later in life, thanks to Driving Miss Daisy and Seven. Another big role for the actor was Azeem in 1991’s Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, starring Costner in the title role. Costner’s accent may have been mocked by critics, but the movie still became a huge success, and Freeman soon moved on to bigger projects. One of these was Unforgiven, where the actor plays Ned, the ill-fated best friend of Eastwood’s Munny.

Freeman heard about Unforgiven from Costner during production of Robin Hood and later approached Eastwood about the role. Unforgiven would kick off a fruitful creative relationship between Eastwood and Freeman, with the duo reuniting for 2004’s Million Dollar Baby – where Eastwood scored his second Best Director Academy Award – and 2009’s Invictus.

Costner And Eastwood Later Worked Together On A Perfect World

The only Costner and Eastwood collaboration was Clint’s Unforgiven follow-up

Costner’s hopes of directing Unforgiven didn’t pan out, but he and Eastwood would work together the very next year. Eastwood signed on to A Perfect World as director and had no intentions of playing a role in the 1993 thriller (via The New York Times). However, when Costner was cast in the lead role of escaped convict Butch, he insisted Eastwood play the Texas Ranger pursuing him.

Instead, A Perfect World is a melancholy drama that focuses on the bond Butch forms with a young boy he kidnaps. Despite the star power involved, the film was considered a box office letdown upon release, though A Perfect World still made a healthy $135 million worldwide (via Box Office Mojo). The film didn’t top Unforgiven’s success, but A Perfect World is seen as one of Eastwood’s most underrated works as a director.

The film might be dark and it ends on a bittersweet note, but it’s one of Clint’s most emotional movies too, with Costner also great in an against-type role. A Perfect World marked Eastwood and Costner’s only collaboration, but while the former retired from Westerns following Unforgiven, Costner has returned to the genre many times in the decades since.