The INSIDER Summary:
- Many TV shows have drama both on and off camera.
- Sometimes it's the co-stars who don't see eye-to-eye with each other.
- Other times, the stars have conflict with the creators or networks behind the show.
Audiences love the drama that they get from a weekly television series. If they’re honest, the same audience also secretly loves the drama that happens behind the scenes as well.
Though every show wants to keep its stars and creators looking professional in the eyes of their viewers, there is no PR team capable of covering up every single embarrassing public breakdown, contentious pay dispute, and behind-the-scenes fight.
The feuds on this list aren’t public feuds between unconnected celebrities, such as Rosie O’Donnell and Donald Trump, and they’re not big-budget film clashes like the one between Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy in "Mad Max: Fury Road."
These are the feuds that boil up between TV creators and performers who have to work together for years on end, butting heads and arguing until their contracts are up or the show is cancelled. These feuds are the ones they tried (and failed) to keep hidden from their audiences.
Here are the 15 Most Shocking Behind-The-Scenes TV Feuds.
15. John Belushi and the (female) "SNL" writers
The impact that John Belushi had on the television world for his work on "Saturday Night Live" is immense, as is the absence left in the wake of his tragic early death.
However, being a fantastic artist and comedian doesn’t mean he wasn’t also bigoted and problematic. Belushi was known for intentionally tanking sketches by female writers because he believed women writers simply couldn’t be funny.
Though there were public rumors for years about Belushi’s behavior on the show, the cast and creators generally kept quiet about it after his death, largely out of respect. In recent years, however, braver cast members have opened up about it, including Jane Curtin, during an appearance on Oprah.
She put it plainly: “he felt as though it was his duty to sabotage pieces that were written by women.” The female cast and writers found longevity and fame in the industry, clearly proving Belushi wrong.
14. William Shatner and the cast of "Star Trek"
Everyone remembers William Shatner as the brave adventurer Captain Kirk, boldly going where no man has gone before in the original "Star Trek" series. However, the reason for his memorable performance is much more complicated than fans might realize.
Shatner was notorious for taking away any lines and camera time he could from his cast members, assuring that Kirk was the focus of as much of the show as possible. This didn’t sit well with the other cast members.
No one has had a longer-running feud with Shatner than co-star George Takei. In his autobiography, "To The Stars," Takei mentioned how Shatner would act like he didn’t know who Takei was during the series.
The feud continued through the years, when Takei outed Shatner for snubbing an event to benefit an ailing James Doohan, and Shatner himself went on a YouTube tirade when he was supposedly not invited to Takei’s wedding. These feuds started behind the scenes, but, with a personality like Shatner’s, they were bound to eventually get some attention.
13. Isaiah Washington, Patrick Dempsey, and T.R. Knight on "Grey's Anatomy"
There’s more than enough high-intensity drama to go around on "Grey’s Anatomy," both in front of and behind the camera, but it was a behind-the-scenes fight between Isaiah Washington, Patrick Dempsey, and T.R. Knight that caught headlines and cost Washington his job.
What began as an argument about starting the shoot on time between Washington and Dempsey somehow turned towards Knight, at whom a gay slur was hurled.
He publicly apologized after the news broke of the dispute, and, if that had been the end of it, he may not have lost his job. However, in a Golden Globes cast interview following a win for the show, Washington felt the need to defend himself, denying that he called Knight the slur while at the same time repeating the slur publicly… again.
Though he obviously lost his job on the show, some fences were eventually mended and Washington returned for an episode seven years after he was fired.
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