Kevin Costner refused to cut short eulogy at Whitney Houston’s funeral

Kevin Costner opened up about Whitney Houston’s funeral and explained why he refused to cut her eulogy short.

The couple appeared together in the 1992 film The bodyguardin which Costner played the bodyguard and love interest of Houston’s character.

Costner spoke at the “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” singer’s funeral following her death by drowning in 2012.

THE Water World The star shared more details about her speech, which ultimately lasted 17 minutes, during a recent episode of the Armchair expert podcast with Dax Shepherd. He also explained how he ignored advice to shorten the eulogy he wrote.

“I had been working on this speech…and I tried to compile everything I wanted to do and I finally wrote this speech,” Costner explained.

He continued: “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.” They can play the ad while I’m talking, I don’t care.

Costner also shared his initial hesitation to speak at the singer’s funeral, before being encouraged by cousin and Houston music legend Dionne Warwick.

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

At the SAG Awards in February 2022, Costner spoke about Houston’s hit cover of Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You” and her feature in The bodyguard.

“I don’t think we’ll ever forget when that little song came out, that it blew up,” he explained. “She sang the first part a cappella and musically, the world was never the same.”

He added: “We have a moment of her in this film, we’ll never forget that and I think when films work at their best, that’s what can happen.”

Separately, last month, Costner spoke about his decision to leave the Paramount series. Yellow stone.