No, it's part of the spec. Specifically, DVD Video has one stream of MPEG2 constant bitrate (CBR) or variable bitrate (VBR) compressed digital video. Maximum video bitrate is 9.8 Mbps, total bitrate with audio and subs is 10.08 Mbps. Your player won't care as long as it can keep up, so stay below the maximums. 
That said, there are lists of specific commercial DVD discs that specific players have trouble with. (VBR video is not the cause, however). Off the top of my head, I think DVD Demystified site can point you to some lists. There is sufficient room in the specs and variability in players for such instances to occur. But no, a properly encoded and authored VBR DVD Video should play in any player.
Perhaps you're thinking of DivX players and VBR audio? Or maybe encoding an AVI with VBR audio? That can be a real sonuvabitch if there's any data corruption, often causing sync problems. Not worth the trouble. Hmm, that's a little bit OT, so I'll stop there. 
