{"id":219467,"date":"2025-10-17T09:45:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T09:45:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/219467\/"},"modified":"2025-10-17T09:45:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T09:45:07","slug":"judge-denies-kevin-costners-bid-to-toss-harassment-suit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/219467\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge denies Kevin Costner’s bid to toss harassment suit"},"content":{"rendered":"

A lawsuit against Kevin Costner stemming from an unscheduled rape scene on the set of Horizon: Chapter 2<\/a> will move forward, Variety reports<\/a>. Earlier today, Judge Jon Takasugi denied Costner\u2019s bid to have the suit tossed under California\u2019s anti-SLAPP law, which protects free speech from frivolous litigation. The judge didn\u2019t buy it, saying that he was \u201csomewhat skeptical\u201d that the scene showed, how Costner\u2019s lawyers put it, \u201cthe horrific struggles endured by women [\u2026] including their vulnerability to rape and other forms of violence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stunt woman Devyn LaBella sued Costner in May<\/a> over a rape scene on the set of Horizon 2 that she claims violated SAG-AFTRA rules, which require advance notice and the presence of an intimacy coordinator. LaBella was a stunt double for Ella Hunt, who played Juliette in the first two Horizon movies. According to the initial suit, Hunt left the set \u201cvisibly upset\u201d due to the script changes and absence of an intimacy coordinator. After Hunt walked off, LaBella stood in for Hunt. She had previously worked on such intimate scenes on Horizon, and the production provided a closed set, an intimacy coordinator, and rehearsal time for those scenes. LaBella reported that the scene in question was more violent and humiliating because it was not a closed set, and Costner, allegedly, failed to call action or cut. She claims the experience left her traumatized and humiliated.<\/p>\n

Costner has since denied the allegations<\/a>. \u201cDevyn\u2019s claims against me are absolutely false, and it is deeply disappointing to me that a woman who worked on our production would claim that I or any other of the production team would make one of our own feel uncomfortable, let alone suffer the \u2018nightmare\u2019 she has invented,\u201d Costner said in a court declaration. \u201cI can only assume that the purpose was to use this sensationalistic language to embarrass and damage me and the Horizon movies on an ongoing basis in order to gain a massive and unjustified payday. Equally as bad, having to read about and address allegations I know to be false involving the words \u2018rape\u2019 and \u2018assault\u2019 has been an absolute nightmare.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lawsuit is another stumbling block for Costner\u2019s ambitious Horizon series. Intended as a four-part epic, the first film failed to lasso anyone in theaters, and while the second part is complete, it has yet to find distribution. The other two films have not found financing yet, but Costner has been to Saudi Arabia to accept a lifetime achievement award and for \u201ccursory\u201d talks about funding. More recently, an expos\u00e9 by THR reported<\/a> that Costner \u201clunged<\/a>\u201d at his Yellowstone co-star Wes Bentley on the set of the hit western.<\/p>\n

Kevin Costner clashed physically with Wes Bentley on Yellowstone set<\/a>Kevin Costner calls allegations surrounding Horizon rape scene “absolutely false”<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A lawsuit against Kevin Costner stemming from an unscheduled rape scene on the set of Horizon: Chapter 2…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219468,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75],"class_list":{"0":"post-219467","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-celebrities","11":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219467"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219467\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}