Director Nick Cassavetes is confirming rumors that have long been circulating about the making of the romantic drama The Notebook. He revealed that stars Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams clashed on set through much of the production.

Speaking in an interview with VH1 to mark the tenth anniversary of the film adapted from the best-selling novel by Nicholas Sparks, Cassavetes explains that the on-camera romance (and the eventual relationship between the two stars that blossomed off of it) was far from idyllic.

“Maybe I’m not supposed to tell this story, but they were really not getting along one day on set. Really not. And Ryan came to me, and there’s 150 people standing in this big scene, and he says, ‘Nick come here.’ And he’s doing a scene with Rachel and he says, ‘Would you take her out of here and bring in another actress to read off camera with me?’ I said, ‘What?’ He says, ‘I can’t. I can’t do it with her. I’m just not getting anything from this.’

The story continues as Cassavetes recounted what happened after Gosling stopped the scene. “We went into a room with a producer; they started screaming and yelling at each other. I walked out. At that point I was smoking cigarettes. I smoked a cigarette and everybody came out like, ‘All right let’s do this.’ And it got better after that, you know? They had it out…”, described Cassavetes. “I think Ryan respected her for standing up for her character and Rachel was happy to get that out in the open. The rest of the film wasn’t smooth sailing, but it was smoother sailing.”

Gosling and McAdams began dating shortly after the release of the film in June of 2004 only to break up in 2007. Speaking with GQ Magazine after the split, Gosling said that he felt people who thought that their relationship in the film was anything like the one they shared in real-life were doing the couple a disservice. “Rachel and my love story is a hell of a lot more romantic than that.”