You've talked about wanting to make a Western but it is impossible to watch this movie without
thinking about how slavery as a subject has been largely absent from Hollywood cinema
in the roughly 100 years since, Birth of a Nation. What sense of responsibility did you
have in terms of making a movie that brings slavery out, front and center like this?
QT: Well I always wanted to make a movie that deals with America's horrific past with slavery,
but the way I wanted to deal with it is as opposed to doing it as a huge historical movie
with a capital H—I thought it could be better if it was wrapped up in genre. It seems to
me that so many Westerns that actually take place during slavery times have just bent
over backwards to avoid it, as is America's way. It's actually kind of interesting because
most other countries have been forced to deal with the atrocities they've committed, actually
the world has made them deal with the atrocities they've committed, but it's kind of everybody's
fault here in America—white or black, nobody wants to deal with it, nobody wants to stare
at it. I think, in the story of all the different types of slave narratives that could have
existed in this 245 years of slavery in America, there are a zillion stories, a zillion dramatic,
exciting, adventurous, heart-breaking, triumphant stories that could be told, and living in
a world now where people say there are no new stories—there's a whole bunch of them,
and they're all American stories that could be told; so I wanted to be one of the first
ones out of the gate with it.
Now Jamie, although Kerry and Sam if you want to jump in on this too I'll just ask about...
QT: Black question.
When you read the script, what were your first impressions about being asked to play slaves
in this movie?
JF: Well, I wasn't asked play anything, I actually saw that the movie was already going
and someone else was supposed to play the role, and I though, "Wow, here's another project
that I don't know about." [Laughter] Actually, I had a management change. To explain my acting
hustle I said, "I don't care what it is, it's Quentin Tarantino and all these people here."
These people here can tackle any subject matter through artistic ability, that's the first
thing. Reading the script—I'm from Texas, so being in the south, there's a racial component--and
I love the south, there's no other place I'd rather be from—but there are racial components
in the south; my being called nigger growing up as a kid—so when I read the script I
didn't knee jerk to the word nigger like someone from New York or L.A. would knee jerk, because
that's something I experienced. What I did gravitate toward was the love story of Django
and Broomhilda, and the firsts about everything in this film. When you see movies about slavery,
as Quentin has made mention to this, we never get the chance to see the slave fight back,
actually do something for himself. In this movie there's a lot of firsts. When we were
shooting the movie we would comment on how these are some things people are going to
see for the first time. For me, it was about the work and we knew that coming into it there
would be a lot of other things said about it, but it's been a fantastic ride, thus.
KW: I think a lot of times people in the past may have felt nervous about playing a slave
because so many of the narratives that have been told in film and television about slavery
are about powerlessness. This is not a film about that, this is a film about a black man
who gets his freedom and rescues his wife. He is an agent of his own power, he's a liberator,
and he's a hero; so there's nothing shameful about that. It's really inspiring, exciting,
and hopeful. I was very moved by the love story, particularly in a time of our history
when black people weren't allowed to fall in love or get married because that kind of
connection got it the way of the selling of human beings. So to have a story between a
man and his wife, at a time when a black people weren't allowed to be husband and wife, was
not only educational, but again, hopeful. We've seen this love story a million times
about star-crossed lovers, it's just that they don't come from two different Italian
families like Romeo and Juliette, the thing that stands in the way of them being with
each other is the institution of slavery. Django's out to get his woman, but he's got
to take down the institution of slavery to do it. The other thing in terms of firsts
was, I said to Quentin in our first meeting, I feel like I want to do this movie for my
father, because my father grew up in a world where there were no black super heroes, and
that's what this movie is.
Sam, the character of Stephen...
SJ: You ask one question ...Oh, now you're changing the question? You don't want to know
how I felt about all this?
You can mention that, but you've worked with Quentin so many times I feel like the more
interesting thing to ask you...
SJ: I have intelligent things to say about this shit.
I want to talk about the psychology of this character that is to me, maybe the most interesting
character in the film. The relationship that he has to Calvin Candie, but also to the other
slaves, and the small power he's holding onto...
SJ: Small power!? I'm the power behind the throne. I'm like the spook-Chaney of Candieland.
Yeah, I'm all up in that. To tell this story you have to have that character, specifically
in that type of setting. I got the script from Quentin, he called me and told me he
wrote a Western and he wanted me to read Stephen, and I complained about being 15 years too
old to play Django. When I read the script I called him back and said, "So, you want
me to be the most despicable Negro in cinematic history?" We both kind of laughed together
and said. "Yeah! Let's get on that." Not only was that a great artistic opportunity to create
something that was iconic, and to take what people know as Uncle Tom and turn it on its
head in a powerful way; it also gave me the opportunity to do some really nasty shit to
the person who got the role I should have had.
QT: Payback's a bitch.
SJ: Yeah, it is. It was written beautifully that way, so I could do that. To tell this
story, you've got to have that guy. Stephen is the freest slave in the history of cinema.
He has all the powers of the master and literally is the master in the times when Calvin is
off Mandingo fighting; he makes the plantation run. Everyone on that plantation knows him
everyone on that plantation fears him. He has a feeble persona that makes people disregard
him in an interesting way, even though they fear him. They think he's physically unable
to keep up and do other things, but he's around. We used to refer to him as the Basil Rathbone
of the Antebellum South, and that's what we tried to do. I wanted to play him honestly,
and I wanted everybody to understand that when Django shows up; that's a Negro we've
never seen before. Not only is he on a horse, he got a gun, and he speaks out. The first
thing I have to do is let all the other Negros on the plantation know—that's not something
you can aspire to, so let me put him in his place as quickly as I possibly can. You gotta
correct that and them know, "You're in the place you're gonna be, and there's no other
place you can be. This nigger's an anomaly, so don't even think about trying to be that."
I whole heartedly embraced that.
QT: One of the things that really has to be taken into account—we know, because we have
historical perspective that slavery is on its way out, it's two years before the start
of the civil war; they don't know that. They have to think that at least for the next 150
years, this is the way it is, there's no end in sight. "All those northerners, those bleeding
heart liberals can say anything they want, it don't mean nothing down here. They don't
understand us, and ain't nothing gonna ever change."
SJ: Even at the end you hear me saying, "There's always going to be a Candieland, this ain't
going away, this is here to stay."
Leo, this is the first film you've been in, in quite a long time where you're not the
only name above the title...
LD: And it sucks! It's very uncomfortable for all of us.
...but also where you are one of--although perhaps not the biggest villain of the piece,
but a villain non-the-less. Can you talk about what made you want to take on this role?
LD: Obviously, Mr. Tarantino here was a major factor. You know, we all read the script,
there was a lot of buzz about this script for awhile, and people were talking about
the next Tarantino movie that was about to come out. The fact that he tackled this subject
matter, like he did with Inglorious Basterds and created his own history, and tackle something
as hard core as slavery and combine it with the genre of having it be this crazy Spaghetti
Western feel to it, with this lead character that obliterates the cankerous, rotting south
was completely exciting. He wrote this incredible character, and as soon as I read it I was
incredibly excited. This man, as Quentin put it, is a character that represents everything
that's wrong with the south at the time. He's like a young Louis XIV, he's this young sort
of prince that's trying to hold onto his privileges at all costs. Even though he was integrated
his whole life with black people, even being brought up by a black man, and live with him
his entire life, he has to find a moral justification to treat people this way, and continue his
business. The fact that he's this Francophile but he doesn't speak French point out that
he's a walking contradiction. He's lives with and is brought up by black people, yet he
has to regard them as not human. There was absolutely nothing about this man I could
identify with. I hated him and it was one of the most narcissistic, self indulgent,
racist characters I've ever read in my entire life.
SJ: You had to do it.
LD: I had to do it. It was too good, not to do. It was too good of a character in that
sense. This man just writes incredible characters, and of course, it was the opportunity to work
with all these great people, too.
I understand in the scene where you had to break a glass, you actually broke that glass?
JF: Man that was crazy. He didn't see what was going on. We were doing a diner table
scene, and that whole day people were coming up from the offices wanting to see Leo doing
the scene. He and Sam were just going to work, it was amazing. What happened was, the shot
glass somehow slide over what he was always slamming his hand down on. In one take, he
slams his hand down and the shot glass goes through his hand. Now blood is shooting out
of his hand and I'm thinking, "Does everybody else see this?" This is crazy, and he keeps
going. I almost turned into a girl just looking at it. What was amazing was that he was so
into his character that even when they finally said cut, he was still this guy. I think people
were ready to give him a mini standing ovation at the time. It was amazing to see that and
amazing to see the process from my end, of these two guys making it real. At one point,
we were in rehearsals, and Leo is saying his lines—nigger this and nigger that—and
he was like, "Buddy, this is tough." Then Sam pulls him to the said, and I'm paraphrasing,
but Sam pulls him to the side and said, "Hey mother fucker, this is just another Tuesday
for us, let's go."
KW: That sounds like an exact quote.
JF: They were trying to really go back to that time. I don't know if you remember this,
but the next day I go to Leo and I said, "Yo, what's up Leo," but it was almost like you
didn't hear me. He didn't speak to me that day. They actually went into these characters
and made these characters come to life.
Dr. King Schultz, Christoph Waltz—can you talk about reuniting with Quentin on this
movie and was there any hesitation on either of your parts on working together again so
soon after this very iconic character in Inglorious Basterds?
CW: Neither, there was no reunification and there was no working again. This was just
another mushroom of the fungus that was growing subcutaneously in me, all the time.
SJ: Process that!
QT: I had this same problem with Sam for about, a decade. It's hard not to write for these
guys; they say my dialogue, so well. For ten years I'd write something cool; Bill for instance.
For seven months of the year and half I spent writing Kill Bill, Bill sounded just like
Sam. They say my dialogue so well. The way I write, I always kind of fancy it as poetry,
and they're the ones that make it poetry; they come out of my pen. Sometimes it's not
even appropriate, but I can't shut it off. I've been wanting to do this story for a long
time and there was never a German, dentist, bounty hunter in the story. The next thing
I know, I sat down and wrote that opening scene, and he just flew right out of the pen,
like it was the tenant of God, boom.
Christoph, can you talk about the physical training for the role, because I know you
injured yourself pretty severely at one point.
CW: I worked very hard, and succeeded most gloriously in falling off a horse, very quickly.
This was very early on in the training. Then on, my work was a little slower for the first
few months, then I got back up on the horse.
Don, your performance is very exuberant, which is something we seem to think of when it comes
to Quentin's actors, they always seem to be having a lot of fun. What is it about working
with Quentin that brings this out in a performance?
DJ: As Quentin told me, he said, "You sing in my key." I looked at Big Daddy Bennett
as a character who had his fiefdom and he was fully engaged in his fiefdom. As everybody
has mentioned, they all though this was going to go on forever; until these two mother fuckers
showed up. They messed up everything, so they gotta go.
SJ: You tell 'em Big Daddy! I love her.
DJ: I enjoyed working with him. We all have what I think is a second hand or this look.
There's almost no dialogue needed. I'll finish a take and I'll look at Quentin and he'll
give me some sort of hand signal, and he looks like one of those Navy signal men or something
like that, and I know exactly what he means, but I don't know how I know it. We'll do it
again, and I'll see him and this time the signal means something like, let's bring that
in on the other aircraft carrier. It was fun.
SJ: I remember the first day I got that, I went looking for Quentin and the day I got
there the slaves were in the field you guys were coming up on the plantation for the first
time, Jamie has his little lord Fauntleroy suit on, and I was walking down that road
through the cotton field. I didn't realize until I got to the middle of the cotton field
that all these extras were out there in their slave gear, and there was cotton and they
were picking it, and there where these white dudes on horses with shotguns. Then I look
back and Don was up on the porch of the big house and I was like, "Oh shit, we're doing
this." It was almost like a Twilight Zone episode, it was crazy. I walked up there,
and he had an ice cold drink in his hand, and I was like, "Damn, this is happening."
It was so awesome, but everything started to help us do this movie.
KW: We were shooting on an actual slave plantation called Evergreen plantation in Louisiana.
That lent itself to all of us kind of disappearing into the story because you felt like you were
making the film on sacred ground. You felt like you were re-enacting this behavior where
these crimes against humanity were actually committed. It started to infiltrate everybody's
acting and behavior, choice and relationships.
SJ: Crazy stuff like that happened, like when you got whipped, all the bugs stopped making
noises and the birds stopped singing. It was kind of like, "Oh shit is this back?"
DJ: My dresser, who helped me get my costume every day found out that her ancestors' were
buried in the cemetery on the plantation. That was a serious day, when she came to work
and told me that.
KW: And they were German.
DJ: That's right, they were German, I forgot about that.
Jonah, when you get a call from Quentin Tarantino asking you to play a role called, Baghead
#2 in a movie a movie about slavery, do you even ask to see the script at that point?
Did it take you awhile to find Baghead #2, or did you just say yes?
JH: Yeah, I don't know. I don't know about you guys but I got into this business to work
with great film makers and so I don't care if he wants me to be an extra in one of his
movies. I mean, I don't even know what I'm doing the fuck up here with these guys; I
only worked for like two days on the film. It's kind of an ego stroke that you even want
me here, because I don't really have anything to do with it. I think it was the weekend
that Moneyball had come out and I met with Quentin and he asked if I would do it, and
I was just overjoyed. There wasn't any thought about it, he wanted me to be in the film and
I was just so excited to be there.
Mr. Walt Goggins, as a southerner and someone who's made a lot of films...
WG: Am I the only one? I thought we had a lot of southerner's, Tennessee, Texas...
KW: South Bronx.
Did you have any sense of a cultural responsibility or social responsibility in brining this chapter
of southern history to life?
WG: The scene in the barn for me, what was so difficult about that and the responsibility
I felt as an actor was showing literally and metaphorically, taking a man's ability to
spread his seed in my hands and rendering that impotent. I think that's what slavery
did to African Americans in this country for 245 years. I just tried to be as truthful
and as honest as I could in order to respect the pain endured by African Americans in this
country. I was just grateful to be given the opportunity to do that. The thing about Billy
Crash and what Quentin does so well is; for poor whites in out country at that time, there
weren't a lot of economic opportunities. Once place you could get a job, was on a plantation,
and you could rise through the slave corporation. If you were smart and I guess if you were
ruthless enough, you could really rise to a position of power. Unfortunately, that was
at the expense of a lot of human beings. For me it was about showing a person who had something
to loose by Django being there. It was not just the color of his skin, but it was also
my character's way of life, economically speaking. I was so happy that Quentin gave me that in
to this guy, it made it really three dimensional.
SJ: All that came though, too.
I think the movie is perfect as it is, with its views, but I read this morning that someone
said, a lot was cut form the film. Will we see in the future, everything you cut?
DJ: I'm not exactly sure. I'm going to wait till after the film plays, goes around the
world, does what it's gonna do, and then I'm going to make a decision. I always write these
huge scripts that are almost like novels, and they're not blueprints for a movie. In
fact, I think if I had this to do this whole thing all over again, I would have actually
just published this as a novel, and then done an adaptation of that, after the fact—maybe
next time. I could very well do like what Kevin Costner did when he did the expanded
version of Dances With Wolves on Laser Disc, I could very well do that. I wouldn't be surprised
if I did, but it's too soon right now. I'm all in on this version; I'm all in on it.
So let's get this version out there, play it, everyone gets it; because if I put some
of that stuff in, it's going to change the story. That's good, that can be cool, but
I want this story to be the story for awhile.
For the cast, what types of external sources did you use to help further create or further
develop your character?
CW: In a way I think "outside source" is a contradiction in terms. I can only speak for
myself, but the source is the script. The script has a source; I can point it out to
you.
QT: On the same line, we've got the first issue of the Django Unchained comic book.
The thing that's interesting about the comic book, more to the last question's point, we
keep the entire script in the comic book. Some of the sequences and big chapters we
dropped, the ones we didn't even bother shooting because we didn't want a four hour movie,
are in the comic book. I gotta say I'm as excited about the comic book as I am about
the movie; it's boss!
DJ: I can tell you that that period of time is one of my favorite periods in history in
early developing America, because it's full of deceit, and it's rich in human character,
or lack there of. From the Native American's to slavery, I've read a lot about it. Blood
and Thunder is a great book that I've read before I started this film. There's a lot
of outside material and for me I like to start with outside information and just research.
Then start layering it into my character. You know the ethics of the time, the social
graces of the time. Did they have indoor toilets? No. How were manners created? So I start form
the outside and then I slowly start to bring it all inside. Like Christoph was saying,
there's the source and then for the character, for me, I like to know what it's like on that
day, in that time, with that energy. I do a lot of that work before hand, so when I show up, it just comes out; hopefully.
Leo, what did you learn from playing Clavin Candie?
LD: What was great about doing this roll honestly was the sense of community and the support
mechanism that I had every single day. This was the first character I played that I had
this much disdain and this much hatred for. It was a very uncomfortable environment to
walk into. I've dealt with and seen racism in my surroundings in my life growing up,
but to the degree that I had to treat other people in this film, was incredibly difficult
and disturbing. I think it was disturbing for actors on both ends of the spectrum, but
it was a very uncomfortable situation. We were talking about it before, one of the pivotal
moments for me as this character, and going to the places I had to go to as far as the
treatment of other people was this initial read-through we had, I think I brought up
the point of, "Do we need to go this far? Do wee need to push it this far? Does it need
to be this violent? Do I need to be this atrocious to other people?" Sam and Jamie both said,
"Look man, if you sugar coat this, people are going to resent the hell out of you."
You have to push this guy to the utter extremes because this is all, not only historically
accurate, but it went even further than that with these atrocities.
By holding the character back, you'd be doing an injustice to the film and people will feel
that you aren't going after the truth. That was sort of the thing that ignited me into
going the way I do with the character. Once I did do even more research, and once I started
to watch the documentaries, and read about the sugar plantations; yes, we're just scratching
the surface of what happened in our country. It's a sore subject matter and it's a subject
matter that should be looked at more often and not shied away from, and I commend Quentin
for making a film that combines so many different genres and is as daring as it is at actually
making the subject matter entertaining for an audience. It's a daring concept. What was
great was to at the core of it, have a group of actors that were all mutually there for
one another, to support and drive each other further with subject matter that was very
difficult for all of us, and I couldn't feel like I had a better support mechanism. I honestly
thought like we were cheerleaders for everyone, like, "Damn, that shit was good! Be even worse
to me, next take."
KW: I felt like we relied on each other because we'd be in these awful places and then Quentin
would call cut and we'd all go, "Is everybody okay? Alright, let's do it again."
JF: Especially for Kerry, that one scene when they had to grab your head, we were all like,
"Whoa, you took a beating."
QT: For two days straight, too. There's the real way to do it, and that's Kerry's way,
anything else is bullshit, as far as Kerry's concerned. She was taking a beating for like
two days straight but I was like, "Hey, no, it's all good. That's how we have to be, anything
else is going to be baby. We gotta go forward." I
was like man, she's the real deal. There was
only one thing I was sort of uncomfortable about, not shooting, but at the very, very
beginning stages of finishing the script. It's one thing to write, "Exterior: Greenville—where
the slave auction town was—100 slaves walk through this deep shit mud in chains, being
moved along wearing masks and metal collars," and this whole town that's built as almost
this black Auschwitz. It's one thing to write that, it's another thing to get a hundred
black folks, put them in chains and march them through the mud. The same thing about
putting the cotton in, "An army of black folks dressed as slaves in the hot sun, picking
cotton." I started to question if I could do it. I don't think I've ever thought that
about anything when it came to my work before. I started thinking, "Can I do it, can I be
the reason that that's even happening?"
I actually came up with an idea of possibly shooting just those sequences alone, maybe
in the West Indies or shooting it in Brazil; where they have their own issues of slavery,
but since this is an American story, there would be a once removed quality. Frankly,
my problem was having Americans do that. I was almost trying to escape it. How can I
do it, but get around it someway, so I don't have to deal with the pain? I went out to
diner with Sidney Poitier, and I just finished writing the script, and he's kind of a father
figure to me. I was explaining my little harebrain scheme of escaping, maybe doing this and maybe
doing that. He listened to me and he basically told me, I had to man up. He goes, "Quentin,
for whatever reason, I think you were born to tell this story. You need to not be afraid
of your own movie. You can't tell this story, if you're afraid of your own movie. You just
need to do it. Everybody knows what time it is, we're all professionals, everybody gets
it. Just treat them with love and respect, treat them like actors, not atmosphere, let
them know why they're there, and what you're doing and what you're trying to get across;
and it will all be good. By the way, you're going to be doing this in the south, those
people need money, and they need jobs, you gotta do it."
SJ: Then you find out they played slaves in Uncle Tom's Cabin, and they're scheduled to
go into other roles as slaves when they're done with you.
QT: Yeah, there were a lot of guys who said, "Yeah man, I was just in Lincoln. I was a
slave in that; I'm a slave in this.'
SJ: "I got that, I'm good with that."
KW: Well, I'll tell you one thing that came as a result of doing that though that was
one of the most profound days on our set. We were shooting one of these days of picking
cotton in the Louisiana heat and everybody was really hot and exhausted. You could tell
that the waking up every day and putting yourself in the mental state of somebody whose constitution
says you're a fraction of a person and not a whole human being; you know it was just
starting to wear on everybody a little bit. We had this one background actor who was a
pastor who kind of paused everybody and said, "We have to remember that we are the answer
to these people's prayers. That the people who did this work dreamt of a day where you
could not be property, but own property. Where you could read, where you could vote, where
you can get married, where you could have a job and be compensated." Again, on that
sacred ground it forced everybody to shift and man up, and own that fact that we can
be so blessed to come here and tell this story, and not feel victimized by it, and know that
it's a story about a hero. That's a profound opportunity.
This film is probably your most straight forward in terms of chronology. Was there an earlier
cut where you fractured the timeline as you have in past films? In general, how did you
find this particular movie in the editing room?
QT: It was a conscious decision right from page one, not to do my normal narrative tricks;
to have separate chapters, or all of a sudden look at the piece from a different character's
point of view or perspective accumulate somewhere else down the line—this had to be Django's
journey from beginning to end, it had to be his odyssey. As the terrains changed, as Django
and Schultz cross all over America to get to Broomhilda; that journey was so important.
A couple of times, Harvey would say, "Well, can we do a Kill Bill Volume 1 and Volume
2 type of thing?" It wouldn't work here. It worked in Kill Bill because it was very episodic.
It would be completely unsatisfying. People would have a right to get up in arms at the
end of the first movie if we did that. You need to see Django start his journey, and
complete it, in one scenario. That's what was really important about it. As far as the
film taking shape in editing, because there are so many different emotions in this movie;
there's the exciting Western adventure aspect of it, there's the gallous humor like comedy
that runs through it—especially with the pairing of these two guys. There's the pain
of the story, there's the catharsis of the story, there's the suspense, and hopefully
at the very end, there's the cheering. If the audience isn't cheering at the end, then
I haven't done my job. So balancing all those different emotions so I got that cheer at
the end, was the biggest issue when the editing is concerned. Frankly, when it came to the
pain, I could have gone forward, I have more of a tolerance. Part of it was, I wanted to
show how bad it was, but then I don't want to also traumatize the audience so bad that
they can't enjoy the movie, and be where I need them to be in the last reel.
I once had a scary experience on a horse on my honeymoon; did you guys have any of your
own troubles with the horses, Christoph I know you said you feel off one? I'm sure directing
with horses isn't that east as well?
CW: I've been married too long, honeymoon's over. I just fell off.
JF: I actually ride my own horse in the film. When I met with Quentin, he said, "We'll I
gotta get you on a horse." I told him, "Actually, I have my own horse that I got about 5/6 years
ago for my birthday." So he said, 'Yeah, let's go ahead and try it." So, my horse is actually
in the film, and what's interesting about my horse in Django is that they sort of learn
together. As he learned tricks, Django was sort of evolving as a person, as this super
hero, all the way until the end of the movie where you see my horse Cheetah do the trick
at the end.
SJ: The horse donuts.
JF: Yeah, the little horse spinouts. So, for the whole duration of the film we worked on
that. The only thing that was scary was riding bareback. Quentin comes up and says, "Well,
I need to get you on the horse bareback just for a little bit, just let it gallop a little
bit." The horse was used to the stunt person, so when I got on the back of the horse and
onto this first track, there were people at the end of the track with their sleeves rolled
up, ready to catch me, in case something happened. The horse turns and sees the camera truck
and is used to the stunt person—so off he goes, 28 miles an hour. Now, on the outside,
I look like Django — but on the inside, I was Little Richard. I was like, "Oh, Lord
Jesus. Lord Jesus, Lord Jesus, please stop this horse, Lord Jesus stop this horse." So
I'm thinking, we got it, right? Of course, as directors go, Quentin pulls up and says,
"Hey man, you know that was great—I need to get it, one more time."
So what happens this time is, at first the camera car was a little behind us and there
was no real action cue. This time we go back and this time out of his turn, the horse sees
the camera car it about 10-15 yards up ahead, so he now thinks, he's behind. So out of the
turn, he takes off again, only this time, I'm on the side of the horse. Dash (the stunt
man) told me before, "Hey look, this is freaking crazy but look, if you feel like you're about
to come off the horse, just let go of the son of a bitch, but get off." In my mind,
those words are ringing in my head as I'm on the side of this horse going 28 miles an
hour and I'm thinking, "He's a damn fool if he thinks I'm letting go and getting off this
horse." Now, luckily since the horse did it twice burns out just a little bit, so it allowed
me to bounce back on top of it and get it done, but that was the craziest.
QT: I gotta say though, that's actually in my top three favorite Django shots of the
movie. You with a handful of mane and a rifle in the other hand, he doesn't even have use
of his hands. That was just, damn, Burt Reynolds, Navaho Joe in every way.
Do you have any plans to show the movie to the President or any type of Republican politician
types?
QT: I don't know about that. I wouldn't be surprised Barack and Michelle watched the
movie. That wouldn't be the most surprising thing in the world.
This is one of the most outrageous and courageous films to come out of Hollywood in awhile,
yet it's being very well received, why do you think that is?
QT: Well hopefully because it's a good movie, and that's not a smart ass answer. When you
talk about this, you always seem to have to go down the dirt road of having to talk about
the horrible time of that past, and that's fair enough, but I hope, that if you leave
your house and go to a movie theater and pay for a ticket, to sit with a bunch of strangers
and watch this movie, you're going to have—ultimately by the end of it a great time at the movies;
and I think so far, so good.
SJ: Quentin always writes movies he wants to see. We watch a lot of the same kind of
movies and we talk about that stuff all the time, so he writes movies that he wants to
see. He generally writes a role in there that I'm gonna do, because I want to see myself
in that kind of movie. I think I represent a lot of movie goers; he represents a lot
of fans, also. When you get it right, you get it right. It's an entertaining film. Yeah,
you know there's some stuff in there, and some of it's horrific, but it's a great film.
When you come out of there, you feel like you got your monies worth, and ultimately
that's what happens.
KW: I also think the theme, the impedance for all the adventure and action and all of
it is, love. It's a completely universal theme; everybody wants to be loved, so badly, that
their prince would slay the dragons...
SJ: Oh that's some girlie shit, it's Shaft on a horse. It's Shaft in the old west with
a little Hong Kong ballet thrown in there.
KW: Something for everybody, something for everybody.
Calvin Candie, in that scene with the skull, it reminds me of a mixture of a Grimm's fairy
tale "The Prince Who Feared Nothing" and Nazi doctor, Mengele. Can you talk about the inspirations
for that evil you say you have nothing in common with?
LD: That sequence where we talk about phrenology—that's when the culmination of everything in that
character comes to be, in that scene there. Phrenology was that insane sort of pseudo
science at the time, where people were trying to examine the inner working of the human
skull to determine our motivations, our instincts, and our emotions. What southern slave owners
did pre-Civil War, during that time was use that pseudo bogus science to justify the difference
between these two peoples. Like I said, he's this walking contradiction, he's the Francophile
that doesn't speak French, he thinks he's a scientist but knows nothing about real science
or what the hell he's talking about. He starts to examine and prove to these people that
essentially there is a difference between "our two species." It's this sort of insane
logic that gives him this justification for treating people the way he did. That was my
connection to him.
Also, he is that Prince that is so incredible self indulgent thinks 24 hours a day about
what's going to satisfy him without any sort of regard for human life. He was born into
a world of privilege and wanted to sustain this plantation at any cost, sustain his family's
lineage. You have to understand at the time, for him, slaves were the oil of the south.
To him, they were the driving force that one a daily basis produced the crop that gave
him the money to sustain his business, and to take them away from him, would be to strip
him of everything he's known in his life; it would have stripped him of his identity.
I don't know if that answered your question...
SJ: How dare you question his upbringing, I thought I did a good job.
QT: You know, one thing that need to be said here is, and it's a shocking thing to contemplate
is; the idea that on the planet earth that there's just not Anglo-Saxon humans, that
the rest are sub-human—that being proved to not be the case is a relatively new idea.
The idea of sub-humanity has existed for such a long time. In fact, Winston Churchill, as
late as 1947; in trying to hold onto the British Empire in India talked about how we should
not be embarrassed about Angelo-Saxon superiority—it's just the way it is, and that was Winston Churchill.
This whole idea that there is no such thing as sub-humans as to humans—I didn't use
animal analogies in this movies because I already wore that out in Inglorious Basterds,
but they would constantly use, "A horse is not a donkey, they are sub of this." The idea
that we all think that's bullshit now, is a relatively, new idea.
JF: And what I hope to happen in your DVD when you do show all of the things that were
left out—there was a very interesting conversation in this movie Christianity, or what God deems
to be true. You see it in the movie when the Brittle Brothers are getting ready to whip
little Jody. Quentin does a fantastic thing if you're able to catch it—one of the brothers
has bible passages, tacked to his shirt, and he's saying something from the bible. There
were actually two things going on at that time; they felt by God that they have dominion
over slaves, slaves that could not read the bible and had no idea what these people were
preaching. That was an amazing thing to see, the science and the religion because my question
had always been, just about slavery, "Do slave masters go to heaven?" We didn't put this
in the movie, but what does Django believe about God? Does Django have a beef with the
man upstairs? Because the fact is, I was only born. I didn't have anything to do with being
black, but all of a sudden, all of this is heaped up on me, so what does Django actually
believe? I think the movie is going to create a lot of great conversation once everyone
sees it.Let's ne honest, black folks were just holding their breath when this movie
was about to drop, and then when you see it, you're like, "Wow, we may not feel 100% great
about everything, but it was amazing, and it was entertaining." I told them earlier,
Stan Lathan, who we hold in high regard in his opinion; he's been raving about the film
about how entertaining it was, and how we got a chance to touch all the bases.
QT: Actually, Leonardo gave me a book, because we were talking about the phrenology from
a scientific angle, but we were talking about it coming from a religious angle. He gave
me a book that was called, Negro: Beast of Man. It wasn't even written in the 1800s,
it was written in like, 1904. I had this book and it introduced a word to me that I had
never heard before; the adamic man. What the adamic man means is—their whole philosophy
is, the proof that black folks are sub-humans to white folks humanity is the fact that—can
it be possible that black folks were the descendents of Adam & Eve? To them it was positively,
no. Now, what are they using? They're using the stupid-ass white illustrations that they've
seen in the bible that they actually feel is photographic evidence. But I hadn't even
heard that expression—adamic man, before.