Kevin Costner refused to cut his eulogy to Whitney Houston at her funeral

Kevin Costner never stopped protecting his friend and comrade Whitney Houston after they starred together in The bodyguard – not even after his tragic death two decades later.

In the latest episode of Dax Shepard’s Armchair expert podcast, Costner reflected on his connection to Houston and the moving eulogy he gave at her funeral, which he refused to shorten despite time constraints.

“I had been working on this speech…and I tried to compile everything I wanted to do and I finally wrote this speech,” Costner, 69, recalled. “Someone said, ‘CNN is here, they wouldn’t mind if your remarks were shorter because they’re going to have commercials.’ And I said, “They can get over it.”

Costner wanted to make sure he said everything he “needed to say” in his speech. “I started and about 17 minutes later I was done,” he added.

The actor was one of eight speakers at Houston’s funeral in 2012, following his death by accidental drowning. He was asked to speak because of his close relationship with the singer, which began when they made The bodyguard together in 1992. The romantic drama starred Houston as a famous singer haunted by a stalker and falling in love with his bodyguard, played by Costner.

Although Houston and Costner remained close over the next 20 years, he was initially hesitant to speak at her funeral. It was only thanks to Dionne Warwick’s encouragement that he finally said yes.

“I could feel the weight on her, now it’s transferred to me,” Costner recalled on the podcast. “What am I going to say about this little girl? (I) went back to this church in Newark and it was packed. It was electric. There were two bands playing, the church was alive . It was like, boom!”

In addition to playing in The bodyguardHouston co-produced and recorded six new songs for the soundtrack, including her hit cover of Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You”, which remains one of the best-selling physical singles of all time and has won the Grammy for Recording. of the year in 1994. (The soundtrack itself won album of the year.)

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“I don’t think we’ll ever forget when that little song came out, that (Houston) blew up,” Costner recalled in 2022. “She sang the first part of it a cappella and musically, the world no longer never been the same. “We have a moment of her in this movie, we’ll never forget that and I think when movies work at their best, that’s what can happen. ”