Edward Zwick, the director of Legends of the Fall, revealed some damning claims about Brad Pitt when they filmed the 1994 epic.
Revealing the juicy parts in his memoir, Hits, Flops, and Other Illusions: My Fortysomething Years in Hollywood, the filmmaker claimed the Oscar winner almost walked away from his project.
After the first table read, the 60-year-old agent told the director he wanted to quit.
"It fell to [producer] Marshall [Herskovitz] to talk Brad off the ledge," Edward penned in the book's extract, which will be published on 13 February.
He continued, "It was the first augury of the deeper springs of emotion roiling inside Brad. He seems easygoing at first, but he can be volatile when riled, as I was to be reminded more than once as shooting began and we took each other's measure."
Tom Cruise was initially tapped for the Tristan Ludlow role but dropped out, leading Brad to replace him.
The Oscar-nominated director noted, "Sometimes, no matter how experienced or sensitive you are as a director, things just aren't working."
Edward alleged, "he would get edgy whenever he was about to shoot a scene that required him to display deep emotion."
In the film, Brad played one of the three sons of a father in early 20th-century Montana whose lives came in the crosshairs of war, love, and nature.