Timothy Olyphant addresses Walton Goggins feud on Justified set

Timothy Olyphant has addressed Walton Goggins’s claim they “had a tough time” on the set of Justified.

Last month, Goggins, who appears in hit Prime Video series Fallout, said in an interview with The Independent that, while they started out on good terms, by the end of the FX show’s six-season run in 2015, their relationship was fractured.

Goggins said the pair “weren’t talking” by the show’s finale, stating: ”We were so deep into these people we were playing, and they were so polar opposite at this point in the story… I think we were both obsessed with our own points of view, just carrying the weight of this conflict.”

In the show, Olyphant played strong-willed US lawman Raylan Givens, while Goggins played local criminal Boyd Crowder.

Olyhant, who is now on good terms with Goggins, has now reacted to his co-star’s claim in his own interview, sharing his “own version” of events.

He told Vanity Fair: “OK, here’s my version. I adored working with Walt from the jump, but these actors, they’re a pain in the ass. They get really into their work.

“There was this thing where, as the show went on, and especially as the thing came to an end, where I would come from the writers’ room. They’d add things that were like, ‘Here’s what we need Walt to do in order to get to this finale we want.’ Then Walt would say his character would never do that, and then I’d be like, ‘Goddamn it.’”

Olyphant said that, while they would “get really frustrated with each other”, he also thinks the impending finale contributed to the feud as it weighed so heavily on their minds.

“I also think looking back, people have a hard time saying goodbye,” the actor continued. “Every time I’m on the end of any shoot, the longer the shoot, the more you feel it. Everybody starts acting funny. Summer camp comes to an end. I’d love to say that I’m immune to that, but I’m not.

“I’m always aware that for everybody, it’s difficult to leave. Some people make it easier to walk away, whatever it is.”

Olyphant says he has “always adored” Goggins, whom he called “special”, and said “it was fun” to watch his performance as The Ghoul in Fallout.

“I know he had a ball doing it,” the actor said, adding: “I’d work with him again in a heartbeat. And I’m assuming if we do it again, he’ll be more predisposed to listen to me.”

Olyphant will next be seen in action thriller Havoc, the new film from The Raid director Gareth Evans, and Noah Hawley's forthcoming Alien series, which will be a prequel set three decades before the original Ridley Scott film.