Rumors of a feud between former co-stars of "The Good Wife," Julianna Margulies and Archie Panjabi, have reignited in light of Margulies denial of such animosity and Panjabi's tweet suggesting otherwise.
Speculation built over the last four years of the show regarding the behind-the-scenes relationship between "The Good Wife" stars who rarely if ever appeared in scenes together (other than speaking on the phone) after the second season. Panjabi exited her Emmy-winning role as Kalinda Sharma on the CBS drama at the end of last season.
Showrunners Robert and Michelle King tried to give fans a satisfying end to what was a wonderful friendship between Kalinda and Alicia Florrick (Margulies) in the closing moments of the sixth season finale, but eagle-eyed viewers soon realized the actresses shot their final scene at the bar separately thanks to some CGI trickery.
Margulies denied any feud between the actresses in a recent interview with Vulture.
"Right, I've heard about [the feud]. Who says that? It's totally gossip," Margulies told Vulture. "I heard that question had been asked to Robert King. There's no story there, sorry ... I actually had heard [that rumor] and I feel that it has been talked about and answered. I feel people just like to have gossip or make something into something that isn't there. There's no animosity on my part. It's a shame, because I wonder if it was two men, when one finds out that he fucked his best friend's wife, if it would get that same attention, you know what I mean?"
She also claimed Panjabi was unavailable to shoot the scene together because she had already started production on her other show, "The Fall."
"It was shot the way Robert wanted to shoot it, and the story line, too," she said. "You also have to remember, there's difficulty ... [Panjabi] was also doing another show, called The Fall. I went along with whatever Robert asked me to do and I did it happily."
Panjabi quickly fired back on Twitter, insisting she was in New York at the time and ready to shoot the scene. Her tweet also linked to the Vulture article.
https://t.co/7Ci8jY9lSf. @TheFallTV was not even in production at that time and I was in New York ready to film the scene!
— Archie Panjabi (@PanjabiArchie) October 5, 2015
Shortly after the finale aired, Panjabi would not confirm or deny whether she and Margulies filmed their last scene together separately.
"All I can say is this: the decision making process is not something I'm privy to," she told E! News in May.
The seventh season of "The Good Wife" returned to 9.37 million viewers on Sunday night, about even with its spring finale.
