‘Yellowstone' actor Neal McDonough walks back comment that Hollywood ‘turned' on him for refusing to kiss on-screen
In fact, the actor, 59, is taking back his previous remarks that the industry turned on him for refusing to kiss his co-stars.
'We want to say thank you, Hollywood,' McDonough's wife, Ruvé Robertson, said during a joint interview with TMZ on Thursday. 'I don't like how people are saying that Hollywood turned its back on Neal. No, it didn't. The right people found Neal and put him in the right place.'
10 Neal McDonough on the 'Nothing Left Unsaid' podcast.
Nothing Left Unsaid/YouTube
The producer added, 'We want to say thank you, Hollywood. We want to continue doing incredible films with Neal, giving the right messages. We don't want to say Hollywood turned. Guided us to where we are is what Hollywood did, and we want to say, 'Thank you, Hollywood.''
McDonough echoed his wife of 22 years' sentiments, telling the outlet, 'Everyone talks about that stuff that happened all those years ago.'
'If it weren't for that, we wouldn't be here,' the 'Yellowstone' alum explained. 'Those were stepping stones, and it made our relationship closer.'
10 Neal McDonough gets candid about Hollywood on a recent podcast.
Nothing Left Unsaid/YouTube
The couple, who share sons Morgan and James and daughters Catherine, London, and Clover, also touched on how their children would feel.
'If they were to see Dad kissing another woman, it would hurt them,' Robertson admitted. 'When Neal swears on film, which he rarely does, we would tell our kids when they were younger, 'Oh, no, that's a dub, that's a voiceover. Dad did not say S—T,' because we don't swear.'
The mom of five also credited their fulfilled life to McDonough's time in showbiz.
10 Neal McDonough and Ruvé McDonough pose during 'The Last Rodeo' red carpet.
Getty Images
'We cannot explain and express how blessed we are, how happy we are,' Robertson stressed. 'Everything that's going on, talking about how Hollywood dissed Neal and whatnot — no. Everything that's happened has brought us closer to where we are now.'
Earlier in the week, McDonough had appeared on the 'Nothing Left Unsaid' podcast, where he shared his experience since breaking into the business in 2001.
'I always had in my contracts that I wouldn't kiss another woman on screen,' he revealed to hosts Tim Green and Troy Green. 'My wife didn't have any problem with it. It was me, really, who had a problem. I was like, 'Yeah, I don't want to put you through it. I know we're going to start having kids, and I don't want to put my kids through it.''
10 Neal McDonough and his wife at an Emmys after party in 2002.
Kathryn Indiek/ImageDirect
However, not everyone was understanding toward the 'Desperate Housewives' star.
'Intimacy is a whole different thing for me. When I wouldn't do it, and they couldn't understand it, Hollywood just completely turned on me,' said McDonough. 'They wouldn't let me be part of the show anymore. And for two years, I couldn't get a job, and I lost everything you could possibly imagine. Not just houses and material things, but your swagger, your cool, who you are, your identity, everything.'
The 'Shift' star even felt like he lost his identity as a performer.
10 Neal McDonough and Nicollette Sheridan in 'Desperate Housewives.'
©ABC/Courtesy Everett Collection
10 Neal McDonough in 'Suits.'
©USA Networks/Courtesy Everett Collection
'My identity was an actor, and a really good one,' he stated, 'and once you don't have that identity, you're kind of in a tailspin. And I was in a big, ugly tailspin for a couple of years.'
After the incident, McDonough – whose acting credits also include 'Band of Brothers,' 'Arrow,' 'Justified,' and 'Tulsa King' – started drinking more.
'I never drank during the set. I never drank during work because I love my craft and I take it with the utmost seriousness in everything I do,' he shared. 'But after work or days off or anything, I still feel like I wasn't a man. I didn't feel that I was doing the right things or some things just weren't clicking.'
10 Neal McDonough, Dawn Olivieri in the 2024 film 'Homestead.'
Courtesy Everett Collection
For McDonough, when he put down the bottle, 'everything just kind of changed.'
'Literally, the clouds parted. I was like, 'Oh. I don't need this crutch. Oh, people are calling me. Oh, I am successful. Oh, I do like myself again. Ok, I am God's child, and I have a job to do. Stop wallowing in self-pity. Dust yourself off and go hit it hard.''
McDonough, who tied the knot with the South African model in 2003, didn't name the show he was allegedly fired from.
10 Neal McDonough and his wife Ruve share a kiss.
DMI
Back in 2019, however, he did tell Closer Weekly that in 2010, he lost his role on the ABC drama 'Scoundrels' because of his no-sex-scene rule.
'It was a horrible situation for me,' confessed McDonough. 'After that, I couldn't get a job because everybody thought I was this religious zealot. I am very religious. I put God and family first, and me second. That's what I live by. It was hard for a few years.'
Luckily, one of the 'Band of Brothers' producers helped the star revive his career.
10 Neal McDonough and his wife at the premiere of 'Minority Report.'
'Graham Yost called me and said, 'Hey, I want you to be the bad guy on Justified,'' McDonough recalled. 'I knew that was my shot back at the title.'
These days, the Hollywood icon has also found a way around the no kissing on screen rule.
In McDonough's 2025 feature film, 'The Last Rodeo,' Robertson portrayed his on-screen wife, and they shared a kiss.
10 Neal McDonough attends the world premiere of Disney's 'Zombies 4: Dawn Of The Vampires.'
Hollywood To You / BACKGRID
'She was so great in the movie, and to kiss my wife, my real-life wife, in a movie that I wrote and produced and gave glory to Him in,' McDonough gushed while on the 'Nothing Left Unsaid' podcast, adding that he couldn't picture 'anything really better than that in my life when it comes to my career because it's finally one of those things where I made it, and I did it our way.'
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