Feud Revisited: Rupert Everett Says Calling Madonna 'An Old Whiny Barmaid' Was Meant as a Compliment

Rupert Everett defended his jibes against his former friend and co-star Madonna in an interview from "Life Stories" with Piers Morgan,the Daily Mail reports.

"The actor, 61, and the singer, 62, were once close, but the failure of their 2001 film 'The Next Best Thing' marked the beginning of the end of their friendship," writes the U.S. Sun.

Morgan reminded Everett with a quote 2006 memoir 'Red Carpets And Other Banana Skins': "'An old whiny barmaid.' You didn't finish there, hang on, you called her 'an old whiny barmaid. A curious little thing. Satan and a She-man'."

The exact quote, the Daily Mail adds: "Rupert's exact words in the book were: 'Sometimes, in moments of stress, she had power cuts and the old whiny barmaid came screaming out of the defrosting cold room.' "

Morgan then asked, "And you appear surprised that it put a little fraguar over your relationship?"

Rupert replied: "The whiny old barmaid was meant to be a compliment because, the thing about Madonna when she was very young was she can't talk like that [whiny voice] half the time, you know, and she really got guys like that. And she was really charming. That wasn't meant to be rude actually.' "

Last year, the Daily Mail adds, he told Lorraine Kelly he held Madonna in high regard.

"I'm a great admirer of hers as a person, I think she as well is an amazing woman. And where tenacity has taken her is unbelievable, and so I have great respect for her."

The history of "The Next Best Thing" was fraught with drama, reports the website Bomb Report. It was, sadly, the last film of John Schlesinger, who won an Oscar for "Midnight Cowboy." He was unhappy with the script and planned on working on it as production commenced, but "found himself shut out of the process by the producers. Rupert Everett began to rewrite and rework the script, much to the chagrin of Schlesinger. The director also clashed with Madonna on set and bequeathed a collection of letters and production notes to the British Film Institute after his death in 2003 – many of which were about her demands for expensive computer effects to beautify herself, ridiculous changes to her character and her behavior on set."

The troubles didn't end there. During post-production, Schlesinger collapsed on the street and underwent a triple bypass surgery. "He was then shut out of the completion of the film," writes Bomb Report. "After the picture was finished, Rupert Everett and his writing partner Mel Bordeaux tried to obtain a screenplay credit and went to arbitration with the Writers Guild. They were denied credit. Clearly they were under the misguided impression that this misguided movie was going to be successful."

It wasn't. "Paramount would see returned about $8.1 million after theaters take their percentage of the gross, well below their P&A spend and exposure to the budget. 'The Next Best Thing' was a dud overseas and cumed $9.3 million across numerous distributors."

The Twitter response to Everett's appearance on "Life Stories" was pretty close to rapturous, starting with one from Boy George: