Highlights
- Meryl Streep admitted having “beef” with Goldie Hawn on the Death Becomes Her set in 1992.
- The issue? Hawn was chronically late; Streep was chronically punctual — and not thrilled about it.
- Despite the on-set tension, the two remain close friends and still laugh about the cult classic.
It turns out that even Hollywood’s most decorated actress has her limits — and apparently, those limits involve a certain blonde arriving late to set in a wind-blown convertible while everyone around her melted into a puddle of adoration.
Meryl Streep is opening up about the “beef” she had with her Death Becomes Her co-star Goldie Hawn while shooting the beloved 1992 black comedy, and the backstory is as delightfully specific as you’d hope.
In a Vanity Fair interview published April 30, Streep recalled of Hawn: “Goldie, she was always late to set. But she was so adorable. And I’m always on time, you know, and annoying. But she’s late. And she had a red convertible, I remember, and she’d drive herself to set. So that was probably the problem.”
And it didn’t stop there.
Streep continued: “She’d drive herself to set. She had her hair all… ‘Oh gosh, sorry!’ And everybody thought, ‘Oh, she’s so cute!’ Yeah. So I had a beef with her.”
That’s right. Meryl Streep — three Oscars, 21 nominations, the woman who once made a PowerPoint presentation out of learning a Polish dialect — was undone by Goldie Hawn’s hair and charm offensive.
To be fair, it’s a very effective charm offensive. Despite the on-set tension, the Oscar winner said working alongside Hawn ultimately made it worthwhile. “We just laughed,” she recalled. “She’s the best laugher in America.”
High praise from a woman who does not hand out compliments carelessly.
Streep, now 76, also clarified that any tension is firmly in the rearview mirror. “She’s one of my buddies,” she told Vanity Fair, adding: “I loved her. I love her.”
She added: “Over the years, we’ve had some laughs about that movie because people love it. I thought it was like a documentary on Beverly Hills.”
In Death Becomes Her, Streep and Hawn played frenemies Madeline Ashton and Helen Sharp, embroiled in a battle over beauty, eternal youth, and the affections of plastic surgeon Ernest Menville, played by Bruce Willis. The irony of two women playing rivals who loathe each other while one of them was quietly annoyed with the other’s tardiness in real life is, frankly, the kind of layered storytelling Hollywood rarely intends.
Streep didn’t just kiss and make up with Hawn in the interview — she also had warm words for Willis, whose reputation on other sets apparently preceded him.
“Oh, Bruce was divine,” Streep said. “I guess he was a bad boy on certain sets and came with a little reputation for being difficult, but we had so much fun with him. He was such a gent, and so game, and willing to be ridiculous. I just thought he was wonderful.”
Death Becomes Her earned $149 million at the global box office and won the 1993 Oscar for Best Visual Effects, as well as a Broadway musical adaptation. Streaming now on Peacock, the film has enjoyed a full-blown cult renaissance in recent years — one that even its stars seem genuinely tickled by.
As for the beef? Meryl and Goldie have well and truly squashed it — though one imagines Streep still shows up five minutes early, just on principle.
MORE POP CULTURE HEADLINES
