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Kevin Costner<\/strong><\/a> is seeing the light at the end of the tunnel now that his pricey Horizon: An American Saga \u2013 Chapter One<\/em>\u00a0is earning healthy viewership numbers on Netflix, but he\u2019s still many tens of millions out of pocket and praying the streaming giant buys him out so he can settle debts and salvage some much needed pride in the process, a source exclusively tells Life & Style<\/em>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cKevin is good at projecting calm, experience and a generally level head, but behind the scenes the whole Horizon<\/em> project has been stressful to him financially, physically and even intellectually,\u201d says a source who has worked closely with Kevin, 70, on the multi-film Western saga.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The first installment of the four-part series released to disappointing box office numbers and tepid critical response, but found a home on streaming services, which has begun to make Kevin back some of the $60 million of his own money he reportedly put up to fund the project. The second entry received a warm reception on the film festival circuit, but was pulled before it could release in theaters due to the poor performance of the first part, and still doesn\u2019t have a theatrical release date, if it will ever see one.<\/span><\/p>\n The insider notes that Kevin \u201cstill doesn\u2019t fully understand why the theatrical release of the first part of the story didn\u2019t connect with most viewers, but he\u2019s pressing forward with the rest of the films and he\u2019s finally got some good news in the form of Chapter One<\/em>\u2019s excellent showing on Netflix, where it\u2019s landed in the top ten.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cAnd Kevin and his team need it to perform because right now, Netflix is the only company with deep enough pockets to completely bail him out of the hole Kevin has dug for himself with these movies,\u201d the insider says. Kevin was even facing the prospect of having to unwind his real estate holdings<\/a> to support his passion project. Now, Netflix is \u201cthe only company that can provide Kevin the resources to finish this saga in the next eighteen months without having to cut too many corners.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a big check to write, but if the first movie continues to perform well for Netflix\u2019s viewers, the expectation around town and even within Kevin\u2019s Hollywood circle is that Netflix will eventually step up and buy the rights to the whole series and take Kevin out of debt.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n It would be a serious win for the Waterworld<\/em> star, but also \u201can ironic outcome for Kevin to hope for, because when he originally conceived of Horizon<\/em>, he was thinking about it more as a streaming series than a collection of films.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt was only through the popularity of Yellowstone<\/a>, and the financial windfall it brought him, that Kevin reconsidered and decided to make this story into big-budget movies. Kevin is in an eight-figure hole on this project and he\u2019s finally got some hope<\/a> that Netflix will bail him out and expose the films to viewers all over the world. But Horizon<\/em> has to continue to perform on streaming for that to happen.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n