Kevin Costner reveals his one rule of writing in ‘strong women characters’

Kevin Costner owns up to the fact that the target audience for his films is mostly male. However, he does have a strict rule about the female characters in the movies he directs.

Joining his Horizon cast on the Happy Sad podcast via Variety, the actor and director, 69, acknowledged, “I make movies for men. That’s what I do.”

However, he quickly clarified, “But I won’t make a movie unless I have strong women characters.”

He further reflected, “That’s how I’ve conducted my career and I think that’s why I have a good following.”

For Costner, female characters “drive the story in every plot line” and he “couldn’t conceive of a scene that didn’t involve a woman.”

Having directed and co-wrote the western drama Horizon: An American Saga for nearly five seasons before his recent departure, Costner takes pride in the show’s women-centric plot lines.

During a recent appearance on The Kelly Clarkson Show earlier this month, Costner shared, “This has a tremendous amount of women in it. They play such a big part of the West and what happened. They were often taken out there against their will and with their children on the idea that there was something great out there.”