Hollywood veteran John Goodman has dropped a bittersweet bombshell about his long-lost connection with Roseanne Barr, revealing a silence between them that’s stretched nearly a decade.
The New York Post reported that Goodman, now 73, recently opened up in an interview about his estrangement from Barr, 72, alongside reflections on their iconic sitcom “Roseanne.”
He talked about the dramatic cancellation of the show over Barr’s controversial social media activity, the spinoff “The Conners,” and even a recent on-set injury while filming a new project with Tom Cruise.
Back in 1988, Goodman and Barr kicked off a cultural phenomenon with “Roseanne,” portraying a blue-collar couple for nine seasons through 1997, pulling in massive viewership numbers that today’s fragmented media landscape can only dream of.
“We’d get so many viewers for the show back then — 20, 30 million people,” Goodman reminisced, painting a picture of a simpler time before streaming wars and outrage cycles.
That nostalgia, though, is tainted by what followed in 2018 when the “Roseanne” revival, after a promising 10th season, was abruptly axed in May due to Barr’s inflammatory tweet about a former Obama advisor, a move that even conservatives might admit crossed a line of basic decorum.
“Roseanne’s Twitter statement is abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values,” declared Channing Dungey, then-president of ABC Entertainment, in a statement that felt more like a corporate virtue signal than a solution to anything.
ABC didn’t waste time, spinning off “The Conners” later in 2018, with Goodman returning as Dan Conner alongside familiar faces like Laurie Metcalf and Sara Gilbert, while Barr’s character was written out with a grim opioid overdose storyline.
Barr, unsurprisingly, didn’t take kindly to being sidelined, later venting about an offer to return as a ghost: “You’re asking me to come back to the show that you f–ing stole from me and killed my ass.”
Her frustration is understandable—having your creation repurposed without you stings—but her claim that “God told me” to post that career-derailing tweet raises eyebrows, even among those skeptical of cancel culture’s overreach.
Meanwhile, “The Conners” ran for seven seasons, wrapping up in April 2025 with an unscripted, heartfelt moment where Goodman’s character broke the fourth wall to bid “goodnight” directly to viewers, a touch he personally pitched.
“It was his idea,” confirmed showrunner Bruce Helford, underscoring Goodman’s deep connection to the audience that stuck with the Conner family through thick and thin.
Goodman’s own journey hasn’t been without bumps, as he recently wrapped “The Righteous Gemstones” in May 2025 and moved on to filming “The Revenant” with Tom Cruise, only to suffer a fractured hip in a freak on-set accident in London back in March.
“I was passing Tom, and my legs just went on the floor,” Goodman recounted, describing how he landed hard and couldn’t get up, fearing the worst until X-rays confirmed the fracture.
Now nearly recovered after a frustrating two-month hiatus, he quipped, “So far, so good,” though being sidelined “was driving me nuts”—a sentiment any hardworking American can relate to when forced to sit still.