10 Romance Movie Co-Stars Who Clashed On Set — Where Do They Stand Now?

The irony of co-stars in a romance movie not getting along cannot be overstated, but that's just because we tend to forget the reality of the job is very different from that perfect kiss in the final cut. A romance movie set is basically two people showing up in the morning, sitting in the makeup chair for hours, and then shooting the same tender moment again and again, sometimes 30 times before lunch. When it works, you're convinced you've witnessed something real, but more often than not, that's only the magic of the edit, which keeps the kiss and throws away everything around it. Sometimes, what it throws away is not nearly as romantic or pretty, involving two professionals who would rather be anywhere else.

Yes, love in Hollywood has a long record of being built on bad blood, and many a leading pair has clashed over everything from how a scene should be played to who should have been cast in the first place. Some go method and annoy their scene partners, while others allow ego to get in the way of a healthy work environment. The dislike rarely escapes the set during filming, but sooner or later someone lets something slip, or writes a memoir, or talks to a reporter and the whole story comes out. Watching the film, you'd never think it was made under such dysfunctional circumstances. In fact, there might be quite a few names on this list to give you pause, because between them they filmed some of the most romantic movie scenes in history. One pair, amusingly, even went on to date in real life.

There are few scenes in cinema history as iconic as Noah and Allie's rain-soaked reunion in "The Notebook," but it turns out Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams didn't get along at first. Director Nick Cassavetes said that one day Gosling asked him to bring in a different actress to read lines off camera. He sent him and McAdams into a room instead. 

"They started screaming and yelling at each other," he told VH1 in July 2014, per CBS News. But the shoot was less of a struggle once they, in the words of the director, "had it out." Oddly enough, Gosling and McAdams dated from 2005 to 2007 after the movie's release. In 2024, Cassavetes said he regretted ever sharing the anecdote and apologized to the stars.

Jennifer Grey had reservations about Patrick Swayze when they were set to reunite on "Dirty Dancing" after 1984's "Red Dawn." Grey really couldn't stand the thought of making another film with Swayze since his pranks had worn her out. Swayze turned things around at the screen test, pulling her aside for an apology that ended with both of them in tears. 

The truce didn't last long, though. In his 2009 memoir, "The Time of My Life," an exhausted Swayze revealed that Grey's fits of laughter kept forcing retakes. "The fact that we needed to be a natural match created a tension," Grey explained in a 2022 chat with People. She went on to say that she regrets that they couldn't get along better.

In "I Love Trouble," Julia Roberts and Nick Nolte portrayed rival reporters who bickered their way into love. Unfortunately, only the bickering came naturally to the two lead stars. When the 1994 movie was still in production, Roberts told The New York Times that Nolte could be "completely charming and very nice" but was "also completely disgusting." Nolte sent his reply through the Los Angeles Times: "It's not nice to call someone 'disgusting.' But she's not a nice person" (via Fox News). 

Nolte told Business Insider in 2022 that the falling-out was "partly my fault and a little bit of hers." He also revealed that the two had not spoken since filming ended.

The final moments of "An Officer and a Gentleman" had Richard Gere wearing Navy whites carrying Debra Winger out of a factory. It is among the most recreated endings in screen romance, but off camera, there wasn't much sweeping anyone off their feet. Winger described her leading man as "a brick wall" (per The Guardian), and the description took on a life of its own, long after the 1982 premiere. 

In a 2021 interview with The Telegraph, Winger admitted that she "probably could have come up with something nicer." According to Winger, Gere still brings it up whenever the two run into each other.

Kathleen Turner never warmed to Nicolas Cage's eccentric, cartoonish performance in "Peggy Sue Got Married" as her high-school sweetheart with false teeth and a strange voice. Her autobiography, "Send Yourself Roses," griped about the voice and the teeth, but it didn't stop there. She alleged that Cage had been arrested twice for drunk driving and had stolen a chihuahua he wanted, stuffing it into his jacket. 

Cage sued for libel, and in April 2008, won his case. The subsequent retraction settled the matter of the arrests and the dog, but Turner's opinion of the voice and her experience shooting that film were not part of the settlement.

Director Adrian Lyne asked his two lead stars Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke on "9½ Weeks" to not interact with each other off-camera in an attempt to allow their relationship to build only when the cameras were rolling. You'd imagine that would leave no room for a friendship or even small irritations, but Basinger later said that kissing Rourke was "like kissing an ashtray" (per the Los Angeles Times). 

Rourke, meanwhile, liked to play Billy Idol's "Rebel Yell" at full blast before a scene, a habit the director suspected was meant to get under Basinger's skin. Basinger later told the media that the shoot had taken a psychological toll on her.

Hugh Grant has butted heads with many of his showbiz colleagues, and by his own telling, Drew Barrymore caught some of the worst of it on the 2007 romantic comedy "Music and Lyrics." Grant admitted in a 2016 episode of "The Graham Norton Show" that he made his co-star cry because she'd dared to give him acting notes. In a March 2023 video for Wired, he called Barrymore's singing in the film "horrendous." 

Barrymore has taken all of it in stride. She said on her show that audiences expect a "charming movie star" and instead get "grumpy Hugh" (via The Independent). She also called his insults "his way of loving you," though getting used to him took her a moment, by her own admission.

Jennifer Aniston didn't want to play opposite Jay Mohr for 1997's "Picture Perfect," and she made her feelings known whenever she had the opportunity. At least that's according to Mohr, who revealed in a 2010 chat with Elle that, while filming the movie, his big-name leading lady "was unhappy with my presence and made it clear from day one." 

She allegedly voiced her disbelief at his casting loudly between takes and in front of other actors. Mohr would retreat to his mother's house and break down in tears. At the time, he left Aniston unnamed, but later identified her on his podcast. The "Friends" star has never addressed the claim, so we may never know whether it reflects what Jennifer Aniston is actually like in real life.

No on-set jab has outlived its movie quite like the one Tony Curtis hurled at Marilyn Monroe after the pair shot their yacht seduction scene for 1959's "Some Like It Hot." If you've never watched a Marilyn Monroe film, some consider this the perfect place to start, but the making of the movie was hardly drama-free. 

The crew asked Curtis what kissing her was like, and he replied that it was "like kissing Hitler," as he recounted to Time magazine. The insult lived on for a long time, and while that particular frustration wasn't aimed at Monroe, Curtis apparently fumed over his co-star's long delays in her dressing room and her struggle to deliver lines.

Baz Luhrmann's "Romeo + Juliet" is now recognized as one of the most memorable William Shakespeare adaptations out there. On its set, however, the feud wasn't limited to the Montagues and Capulets. The leads, Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes, reportedly kept to themselves, with some stories casting the former as a restless joker who was too immature. DiCaprio also allegedly considered Danes high-strung. 

"There was definitely a spark, but I don't think either of us knew how to handle it," she told Glamour. Miriam Margolyes, their co-star, saw something more lopsided, and wrote in her memoir "This Much Is True" that Danes was in love with her Romeo but DiCaprio "was dismissive of her and could be quite nasty in his keenness to get away" (per Hello!).