#1675 - Quentin Tarantino

[0] Joe Rogan podcast, checking out.

[1] The Joe Rogan Experience.

[2] Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day.

[3] Thanks for doing this, man. I really appreciate it.

[4] Oh, my pleasure, mate.

[5] I've been a gigantic fan forever, so I'm like a little kid in the candy store today.

[6] Oh, I'm glad, man. We met each other at the comedy store, I think, once or maybe once or twice, actually.

[7] Yeah, at least once, for sure.

[8] Dude, you had a wild ride.

[9] I mean, it's almost, your movie career is almost 30 years old now.

[10] Yeah, exactly.

[11] Isn't that crazy?

[12] Yeah, it's actually wild to think I've been.

[13] doing it this long and still playing the game at this level it's pretty cool well yeah um well it's been such a unique ride for you too right like you wrote let me get this straight you wrote true man true romance you sold it and used the money from true romance to fund reservoir dogs well that was that was going to be the idea right all right the idea was pull this uh microphone up to your fake there we go you can move it around so you don't have to lean into it cool there you go that was going to be the idea was I was selling true romance I was going to get like $30 ,000 and I'd never had $30 ,000 in my life I was a minimum wage kid I was only like making like 150 a week you know and at a video store at a video store video archives in Manhattan Beach and so the thing about it was so that was the kind of plan well I finally got some money then I'll shoot on 16 millimeter this thing that I can shoot in a muffler shop or something, which was Reservoir Dogs.

[14] And I showed it to the guy who ended up becoming my partner on the film, Lauren Spender.

[15] And he read it, and he was like, Quentin, this is a pretty good script.

[16] I mean, we could actually get real money and make a real movie.

[17] And I was like, now, man, I've been hearing that for years.

[18] No one's going to give me money to make a movie.

[19] I haven't done shit.

[20] You know, it's just not going to work out.

[21] It's just not going to work out.

[22] I don't buy it.

[23] Now that I've actually got some money in my hand, I'm going to do it this.

[24] way and take it on the film festival circuit and then he was like okay let's hear what how about this give me give me three months just give me three months if at the end of three months i can't get some interest to make it like a real movie then okay then i'll help you and we'll make the little home movie version and so uh you know so i gave him uh he paid me a hundred dollars i gave him an option for three months and in three months we've got actually somebody who's who was in not the person who ended up doing it but we got somebody who was interested in doing it that would have like given us like 600 ,000 and then we ended up making a deal with um live entertainment which was sort of the the home video home of carolco the big rambo studio and they gave us like 1 .3 million dollars to make the movie when you sit back and you talk about that today does it even seem real i mean that you really were working in that video store and that you really did write that i mean it's got to be a bizarre whirlwind adventure that your life has been well it was like well in a way the working at the video store was the part that was real or you know everything else was like that was the fairy tale yeah um i kept waiting for it all to kind of fall apart at some point yeah this movie that's going to happen is going to fall apart either it's like it all falls through or the company changes their mind or i get fired while i'm doing it and that's the end of that uh I just, you know, and I had had friends who had gotten some places and then things went bad.

[25] So I kept waiting for things to go bad, but then they didn't.

[26] And then I had like at a certain point, I realized, well, they're not going to fire me because the actors really love me. The actors wouldn't allow them to fire me. The actors would walk.

[27] You know, so I go, okay, I guess I'm pretty safe as far as that's concerned.

[28] But, you know, it was more like a situation where up until 91, up until I did Reservoir Dogs, any luck that, that I had was either no luck or bad luck.

[29] Everything was always just a big buildup to a horrible letdown.

[30] In your life or in your career?

[31] In my life, my career, but probably my life too, all right?

[32] And then all of a sudden just as bad as everything went up until that time was as good as it went for the next six or seven years.

[33] It literally just, you know, they say, you know, the pendulum swings both ways.

[34] Well, eventually, after almost my 20s, you know, all of a sudden the pendulum starts swinging the other way and everything worked out.

[35] It was kind of amazing.

[36] Well, you're a unique guy.

[37] I mean, I don't think I have to tell you that.

[38] You have a very intense perspective on filmmaking and the films that you produce are so uniquely Tarantino.

[39] You know, like, I want to see Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, me and Dave Chappelle and the whole crew, Donnell Rollins.

[40] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[41] We did it at 2 o 'clock in the morning, rented out a theater after a show we did in Tacoma.

[42] Oh, no shit.

[43] What a great way to say it.

[44] It was awesome.

[45] Yeah, we did a show in Tacoma, and then after we did the show, we went to the theater and saw it.

[46] And while, spoiler alert, one of the most violent scenes at the end, while Brad Pitt is smashing this woman's head, I'm thinking, there's not a whole lot of dudes you can get away with this movie.

[47] Like, you're kind of grandfathered in.

[48] Yeah, I heard you say that once before.

[49] You know, because I'm like, if somebody else made this movie, I don't think they would allow it.

[50] I think that there would be massive outrage, but it's so...

[51] We are talking about, like, three of the most bloodiest violent killers of the 20th century.

[52] Yeah, yeah.

[53] I think, like, their own madness, grandfathers, their face being bashed in.

[54] Yeah, I guess you can make that argument, but it's just, you know, like I watched death proof the other day.

[55] Yeah, yeah.

[56] It's another one.

[57] Like, there's scenes in that movie that you're like, what the fuck?

[58] You know, like, you have so many what the fuck moments in your films.

[59] Right.

[60] I mean, it's one of the things that people loved about them.

[61] You know you're not going to go to your film and have some, you know, esoteric, you know, interesting, deep, long, possibly boring movie about childhood and trauma.

[62] No, it's going to be wild shit.

[63] Yeah.

[64] Wild shit and gunfire and fucking car accidents and people are going to die and they're going to die in horrific ways.

[65] Yeah.

[66] And that is a signature of your films, but it's uniquely you.

[67] You know, it's like, you know, a person can play a guitar like Gary Clark Jr. Right?

[68] He plays guitar and you could hear a couple of licks and you go, I think that's Gary Clark.

[69] Or I think that's Stevie Ray Vaughn or Jimmy Hendr's.

[70] Your films are, somehow you're in there.

[71] Your fucking DNA gets in those movies.

[72] Well, you know, it's funny because I've been thinking a lot about this because actually the guy I wrote Pulp Fiction with is a guy named Roger Avery.

[73] I love that guy.

[74] Yeah, he's a great guy.

[75] Killing Zoe's fucking fantastic.

[76] Oh, absolutely.

[77] I produce that, you know.

[78] So Roger and me worked at Video Archives together, and we're actually getting ready to start a podcast together.

[79] Yeah, it's going to call the Video Archives Podcast Show.

[80] And we'll just take one movie from that era, the 80s.

[81] or the 90s during the time of the store, the 70s, the time of the store, and just kind of examine it, and it'll be us, and then if there's a guest, they get examining it too, they're a customer, and we just kind of talk about stuff.

[82] But one of the things that was really kind of interesting that I think goes along with what you were saying, as I found myself going back over the movies that we were kind of nutting out over, back when we all worked at the video store in the 80s.

[83] Now, the 80s, to me, the 80s, the 80s.

[84] and the 50s were the worst time for movies ever, because it was just this kind of politically correct time.

[85] Now, in the 50s, it was different, because that was just society was that.

[86] In the 80s, it was self -censorship was going on.

[87] What started that?

[88] Well, it was just the rise of political correctness.

[89] After the 70s, where everything was just go as far as you can, then all of a sudden, everything got watered down.

[90] In the 70s, you had movies where it's like, Characters weren't necessarily the hero.

[91] They were fucked up, but they were interesting characters.

[92] And you sit down and you followed them, whether it be Travis Bickle or Charlie Rain and Rolling Thunder or Joe, Peter Boyle's character and Joe.

[93] They weren't the heroes, but you couldn't even have heroes.

[94] And they could die meaninglessly at the end.

[95] That was actually considered a commercial ending back in the 70s because it just shows how you can't win.

[96] Everything's fucked.

[97] You just can't win in America.

[98] It's just the way it is.

[99] You go and you fight in Vietnam, you survive Vietnam, and you get shot in a liquor store during a holdup.

[100] Everything was cynical.

[101] Then, all of a sudden, in the 80s, all that was washed away.

[102] And the most important thing about a character was that they were likable.

[103] And that was the, every character had to be likable.

[104] And the audience had to like everybody.

[105] And even a movie that pushed the envelope and tried to do chancy things, well, it could do it for about an hour.

[106] Then the last 20 minutes would be them literally going back on everything they did, the first hour, apologizing it and, you know, making everything fine.

[107] I'll give you a good example of that.

[108] Okay.

[109] It's just like, okay, the critics always really preferred Bill Murray movies to Chevy Chase movies.

[110] However, it does seem as if the point of all the Bill Murray movies is that he's this kind of hip, cool, cramudgeon, smart -ass guy.

[111] who in the last 20 minutes gets a transformation and becomes this nice guy.

[112] Yeah.

[113] And almost apologizes for who he was the entire movie, the whole rest of the movie before that happened.

[114] Groundhog Day, Stripes.

[115] Stripes, Groundhog Day, Scrooge, you know, the whole thing.

[116] I mean, like, for instance, Stripes, how does he go from where Warren Oates kicks his ass, deservedly kicks his ass.

[117] He deserves to get belly punched by Warren Oates in that movie.

[118] How does he go from being this incontoclastic?

[119] I don't give a fuck about anything.

[120] I get beat up by Warren Oates to now he's rowling the troops.

[121] And now he's getting their army on during the parade.

[122] And now he's like leading a secret mission.

[123] And same thing with like with Groundhog Day.

[124] I mean, does anybody really think a less sarcastic Bill Murray is a better Bill Murray?

[125] I mean, maybe it's better for Andy McDowell, but not for us as the, as the viewer.

[126] Yet, yet, Chevy Chase movies don't play that shit.

[127] Chevy Chase is the same super -silious asshole at the end of the movie that he is at the beginning.

[128] He never changes in his stuff.

[129] He's always like a bit of a dick and is always completely sarcastic.

[130] I mean, unless they cast him playing a dope like he is in the vacation movies.

[131] But when he's playing like a chevy character, he's, you know, he never apologizes for who he is, stays that way throughout the whole film.

[132] And even if there is a slight change, that's not the whole point of the movie.

[133] Yeah.

[134] It's like turning him into a nice cuddly guy.

[135] Have you ever worked with him?

[136] No, I'd love to.

[137] I'm a gigantic fan of his early work, like the Fletch stuff.

[138] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[139] I just think Saturday Live and so many of these.

[140] Oh, the whole first season of Saturday.

[141] I'm like pretty much all those early movies, except for, oh, Heavenly Dog, all those early movies.

[142] He seems today to be this, like, really uncomfortable person.

[143] He seemed, it's almost like, like, too many people paid attention to him for too long, and it freaked him out.

[144] Like, I don't know him, but when I see, you know, stories about him or interviews with him or, you know, any weird controversy that happens with him, I'm almost like, I think the guy just got overwhelmed.

[145] Yeah.

[146] And now he's just like, get the fuck away from me. Get the fuck away.

[147] You know, like, everything is get the fuck away from me, it seems like.

[148] Yeah, yeah, right, exactly.

[149] You know?

[150] No, but I'm a big fan of his, and he was really handsome for so long.

[151] Oh, my God, yeah.

[152] Really handsome, my God.

[153] For a comedian.

[154] For a comedian, especially for a comedian.

[155] Yeah, like in Fletch.

[156] Yeah.

[157] He was beautiful.

[158] Yeah.

[159] Yeah, and girls loved him.

[160] Foul play and, yeah, it was great, right, right, right.

[161] But he also had, it was a very particularly Chevy Chase style of humor.

[162] No, when he hit on Saturday Night Live, I was watching it that first season.

[163] Yeah.

[164] It's like, by the time he hit, when he would show up in a, in a, in a, in a, you know, in a sketch.

[165] I mean, he was a superstar.

[166] Lauren Michaels even said, it was like, Chevy Chase had to leave for the show to really become the show or else it would have just become the Chevy Chase show.

[167] Wow.

[168] That's amazing.

[169] That's amazing when you think about the group of talent that he was working with the time.

[170] This was like the Guild of Radna age.

[171] They would have all been his backup.

[172] They would all been his backup band.

[173] Wow.

[174] There would have been Chevy Chase and his not ready for prime time players.

[175] Yeah.

[176] You know, he was supposed to play Otter in Animal House.

[177] Really?

[178] Yeah.

[179] You look at it, you can tell it's written for Chevy Chase.

[180] Yeah, it seems like it would fit.

[181] Tim Matheson is basically playing Chevy Chase.

[182] There's a lot of those films that you try to watch today, and you go, Jesus, I don't know if you could ever do this.

[183] Like, there's so many films that you try to watch today.

[184] Like, I just watched Super Bad the other day.

[185] And I'm like, man, I don't even know if you could do Super Bad today, and that's not even that long ago.

[186] Well, I don't believe in that kind of statement because the thing about it is, I think that statement is a kind of self -fulfilling prophecy.

[187] If you say it's going to be a problem, it's going to be a problem.

[188] All right, because it comes with usually the idea, well, I don't know if they would let you do that.

[189] Well, who the fuck is they?

[190] Well, you say that as Quentin Tarantino.

[191] But if you're Quentin Tarantino in 1991.

[192] Well, okay, yeah.

[193] Well, I'm Quentin Tarantino in 1991 doing Reservoir dogs coming on.

[194] off of the 80s, which was the decade of they won't let you do that.

[195] That's true.

[196] And I remember, like, okay, for instance, I'll give you an example.

[197] So I'm working at video archives.

[198] And now, by the way, that whole horrible time.

[199] And by the way, we're going through the 80s part two right now, except there's more of a McCarthy -esque blacklist aspect to it than was in the 80s.

[200] The 80s seemed very, people were doing it to themselves.

[201] Where here is, no, no, people are doing it to you.

[202] But I remember, okay, so in the 80s, this is only happening in America.

[203] In the other countries, they were making bold, wild cinema.

[204] The Hong Kong movies were off the fucking chart.

[205] Pedro Omotivar was, like, making his wild sex comedy.

[206] It's amazing.

[207] Anyway, so Pedro Omotivar had a movie called Matador with Antonio Banderas that came out.

[208] Very funny movie.

[209] The movie starts, the opening credits.

[210] is a guy sitting in a chair in his living room with his pants down around his ankles and he's jerking off and what he's jerking off to are the most bloody violent scenes in slasher movies he's got like all his favorite moments from slasher movies of women getting murdered all cut together and he's jerking off and that's the opening credits and it's just like there was like so nothing like that available in america they're like oh my My God, this is the wildest shit ever, man. This is amazing.

[211] And so I remember of, like, sitting at video archives and I'm saying, well, I want to do shit like that when I'm making movies.

[212] And then one of the guys said, well, they won't let you, Quentin.

[213] And my answer was, well, who's they?

[214] Who are they to tell me what I can and can't do?

[215] Can or cannot do?

[216] And at the end of the day, the proof is in the pudding.

[217] I never let they stop me. I did what I wanted to do.

[218] And by doing what I wanted to do, we changed the 90s.

[219] The 90s stopped being politically correct.

[220] And all of a sudden, like, in one year, Reservoir Dogs, El Mariachi, Man Bites Dog, Romeo is Bleeding.

[221] I mean, all these like wild, ironic, violent movies started coming out that just didn't exist in 1989.

[222] And then come seven, and then I mean, you know, it's like we built a bridge and then everyone followed it.

[223] Everyone went over the bridge.

[224] Was there any resistance?

[225] Like when you wrote Reservoir dogs and people are going over it, were there any people that wanted to water it down or censor it or say it'd be more marketable if maybe you took certain scenes out or?

[226] Well, there was a, in script form, a lot of the violent stuff just kind of went over their heads because they just kind of saw it as a point.

[227] play.

[228] They, there's violent stuff, but they were just talking about how much talking was in it.

[229] But when we when I finished it and had been on the film festival circuit with it for a year when Merrimack's bought it, Harvey tried to talk me into cutting the torture scene out.

[230] With Mr. Blonde and the guy in the chair and the ear.

[231] Getting his ear cut off?

[232] Yeah.

[233] He tried to talk me out of that.

[234] And his reasoning was he might end up of being right.

[235] His reasoning was, look, Quentin, this is a movie that anybody can watch.

[236] But with that torture scene, you're going to alienate women.

[237] They're not going to want to see this.

[238] So you're literally, you're putting your own movie in a little box.

[239] But without that scene, anybody can go and see this movie, and everybody will enjoy it.

[240] And that's kind of actually where I became me, because Harvey was used to winning these type of arguments.

[241] And he had a bunch of yes men going, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[242] And but because I had actually been on the film festival circuit for an entire year, one, I saw that he was right, because people were always walking out during that scene.

[243] Sometimes it would be five, sometimes it would be 35.

[244] They were always walking out.

[245] Because also it's a film festival.

[246] You don't exactly know what you're seeing.

[247] You know, you read it in the catalog.

[248] It sounds interesting.

[249] You know, it's not like, you know, it's not like you're being set up the way you are when a movie opens theatrically.

[250] Right.

[251] You know, so, but I did know that, yeah, no, that's the, that was the moment of truth for most people, that scene.

[252] But now, I think it's the best scene in the fucking movie.

[253] So, and I'd spend a year watching it.

[254] So I was in Buffaloed.

[255] And I go, well, you know, it's that movie.

[256] It's what the movie is.

[257] And, you may be right, but I don't care.

[258] This is the movie.

[259] and it has that scene.

[260] And Harvey realized he wasn't going to get his way and he's used to getting his way.

[261] I stood fast and there was like a beat of like, okay, we're going to lead the scene in it.

[262] I want you to remember that it was Merrimax who left it alone.

[263] Wow.

[264] That's an interesting way to control the situation, right?

[265] To take it and bring it all back to him.

[266] How weird is it for you to have had a relationship with that guy for all these years, making all these films and now see what he's become it's sad it's sad he was like you know he wasn't like he wasn't just this guy who financed my movies he was you know kind of like a father figure i mean he was kind of a fucked up father figure but that's most people's fucking father you know he was a fucked up father figure but he was like you know he was involved in you know uh my professional life for like a long long time so it's like it's you know i think it's sad oh it's definitely sad it's just it's surreal though too right Because we've never seen, other than Bill Cosby, we've never seen, like, a fall like this before.

[267] It's so strange.

[268] Yeah, well, you know, one of the things is funny.

[269] Like, I said an interview with the two women that cracked the case on the New York Times.

[270] I did a talk with them during that time.

[271] I don't really talk about it that much afterwards because I think, well, I did it with them, and that's enough.

[272] But one of the things I ended up, like, saying is, well, I wish I had done more.

[273] during the time and a lot of people like read a lot of what that could possibly mean right well actually what it means is I wish I had talked to the guy I wish I had sat him down and had the uncomfortable conversation I didn't know about any rapes or anything like that I just you know but I knew he was you know like I chalked it up to the boss chasing the secretary around the desk you know as if that's okay but I mean that's how I that's how I kind of looked at it you know He was, you know, making unwanted advances.

[274] That's how I looked at it.

[275] But I wish I'd talked to him.

[276] I wish I had sat him down and go, Harvey, you can't do this.

[277] You're going to fuck up everything.

[278] Do you think that no one talked to him?

[279] And maybe that was how he got so completely out of control?

[280] Yeah, maybe his brother, Bob, maybe.

[281] But, you know, no, I don't think anybody talked to him about it.

[282] And the thing about it is everybody who was in his orbit knew about it.

[283] There's nobody who said they didn't know that didn't know.

[284] If you were in his orbit, and that includes all the big actors who he palled around with, like, they all knew.

[285] They all knew.

[286] They didn't know any, probably they didn't know anything about rapes, but they had heard.

[287] Yeah.

[288] They had heard things.

[289] They had heard about him just, you know, putting the bite on somebody in a limo or something.

[290] that the story of the rich powerful producer and the actress who wants to be in films is a story that's as old as film itself yeah yeah i mean it's just one of those stories that goes on i mean it's it was almost like i mean i don't really have a history in film but from what it's been explained to me that's always what it's been like yeah i don't know i they gave me a tour of shaw brother studios and i'm taking a tour of shawbrother studios and they take me into the screening room and then like okay well okay see that chair in the back there that was reserved for the for the owner of the studio run run Shaw that's where he sat and in the back room is a little bed and that's reserved for where Run Run Run Shaw took the starlets really yeah and it was all wow what you found out about all this like when you're first getting was it a what was that like like going from being a guy working in a video store to entering into this bizarre world of power and influence and...

[291] Well, it started with just going on the film festival circuit because I went from a place where I had like barely left Los Angeles County all right most of my life to like going all around the world.

[292] You know, in one year I was on three different continents.

[293] Wow.

[294] And it was amazing.

[295] I mean, you know, I was like a, you know, I was like a shook up soda can.

[296] I mean, I was just like living the time of my life.

[297] I mean, you know, just going to a film festival.

[298] Forget having a movie in the festival.

[299] And forget having a movie that's like people dig.

[300] You know, just going to film festivals and like meeting all the people and seeing like three movies a day at the film festival and get the program.

[301] Okay, I'm going to see this.

[302] I'm going to see this.

[303] I'm going to have dinner over here.

[304] I'm going to haul ass.

[305] I can get here for the 1030 show of blah, blah, blah.

[306] And being.

[307] interviewed.

[308] I've been waiting forever to be interviewed.

[309] Now all of a sudden, everyone wanted to talk to me. It was great.

[310] And I could hold court on any weird theories about film that I had along the way.

[311] It was awesome.

[312] For me, how I got introduced to you, I'd heard about Resward Dogs, but the first film I saw was Pulp Fiction.

[313] And I saw Pulp Fiction with this girl that I was dating when I first moved to Los Angeles.

[314] And I remember being in Man's Chinese Theater watching this.

[315] And for me, it was like this crazy change in my life.

[316] That was in the first few weeks of it opening yeah because that's where it opened yeah.

[317] Crazy change in my life moving to Los Angeles and then seeing this film and then I remember very clearly like at the end of the film like even in the middle of the film going this is the craziest fucking movie I've ever seen in my life and this scene it symbolized to me like the world was changing like everything was changing it was so wild and so crazy it was a film not it was unlike anything I'd ever seen before.

[318] all the different timelines, how you interwove everything together, but the violence and the chaos and the humor of all of it, like people walked out of that movie theater fucked up.

[319] And I remember thinking, like, wow, like the world is different.

[320] Like, sometimes you'll see a work of art, a something, and you'll say, that thing just changed everything.

[321] It just, it was so wild that it influenced so many other films afterwards.

[322] They tried to be like a Pulp Fiction movie, Are they trying to be wild?

[323] Well, people would ask me about that, and they go, hey, did that really bug you when there was a period of a seem like five years in the 90s where, like, every crime film kind of had this, like, ironic bit.

[324] And they talked about TV shows and played music in a weird way.

[325] Yeah.

[326] And everybody was a smart ass.

[327] And they asked me, like, well, does that, did that bother you?

[328] And I go, well, no, it doesn't bother me. One, I don't think any of them are as good as mine, so it just makes mine look better and better and my dialogue look better and better.

[329] But, you know, one of my favorite directors is Sergio Leone.

[330] And I always considered I was doing to traditional gangster films like, you know, Scorsese kind of Goodfellow kind of movies, what he was doing to traditional westerns when he did his spaghetti westerns.

[331] So then the fact that mine hit and now the fact that I've, not, it wasn't that they were just trying to do pulp fiction or reservoir dogs.

[332] They were trying to exist in the same subgenre of crime film that I had created, which is what all the other spaghetti westerns that came after Leonies had done.

[333] So the fact that it wasn't they were doing just reservoir dogs or Pulp Fiction rip -offs, I'd created a subgenre in gangster films that did not exist before, and they were trying to fill that subgenre.

[334] And that was fucking awesome.

[335] That's got to be a wild feeling.

[336] It was great.

[337] You created a subgenre.

[338] I had affected gangster.

[339] Philip.

[340] I mean, by that point, to do kind of a Scorsese kind of thing was like almost passe.

[341] Yeah.

[342] Well, you brought back John Travolta.

[343] Yeah.

[344] Uh -huh.

[345] Which is pretty wild, too.

[346] Well, I remember even asking somebody, I go, okay, well, when people say Tarantino -esque, what do they mean?

[347] And there was a guy I knew he was a, he's like a film analyst, his name Dave Scow.

[348] And he goes, well, okay, just to give you an idea, it's like, okay, so in bad boys.

[349] Or, yeah, I think it would maybe, no, it's like bad boys.

[350] Like, well, again, bad boys.

[351] Okay, you have a couple of henchmen working for the bad guy, and they're sitting in their car.

[352] And all of a sudden, they have a conversation about an I Love Lucy episode.

[353] Okay, that wouldn't have happened without you.

[354] Yeah.

[355] It's true.

[356] Yeah.

[357] Yeah.

[358] Well, what is that from?

[359] I mean, where have you had this flare for references and this way of layering?

[360] That just comes from being Gen X, man. I mean, that was the whole thing about, like, about that generation is the idea that, okay, in the, okay, the generation before us that, like, lived through the 60s.

[361] They had the 60s.

[362] They had the accoutrement of the 60s.

[363] They had all that 60s music.

[364] And they looked down on the generation that grew up in the 60s, in the 70s.

[365] Like, you didn't have any of that shit.

[366] You didn't have the music that we had.

[367] Well, maybe we didn't have the music you had.

[368] We had on.

[369] music.

[370] But what we did have is we had television.

[371] We had the Saturday morning cartoons that we dug.

[372] We had schoolhouse rock.

[373] We had all the TV shows we liked.

[374] We had speed racer.

[375] We had all these kind of things.

[376] And they meant something to us.

[377] And, you know, kids back then who if their parents didn't let them watch TV at a certain point, well, the parents might have actually had like the best intentions, but they were actually robbing their children of the pop cultural glue that's going to tie them to their generation when they get older.

[378] And so, you know, we had the ABC movies of the week.

[379] I mean, we just, you know, we had all that stuff.

[380] And we had fucking great movies if you were going out and seeing the movies of New Hollywood.

[381] We had all that.

[382] And so when we got older, it was about talking about that stuff.

[383] That was what was worth talking about.

[384] And then to actually have characters in a movie talk about that, that was making them sound realistic.

[385] And to be specific, about it.

[386] Remember that old sitcom?

[387] No, no, no. Talk about, no. You mean Alice, okay?

[388] Talk about, you know, talk about Mel and Alice.

[389] But the dialogue heavy stuff, it kind of, it was a beautiful counterbalance for the explosive violence and the wild craziness of your films.

[390] Well, look, I had thought, I had thought in my 20s, I had wanted to be a stand -up comedian.

[391] I thought that that might be where I would go because, you know, I still look at, to this day, it's been cool how you've been talking so much about, like, the comedy store.

[392] And then there's been all these, like, documentaries come out about it and all these pieces coming out about it and everything.

[393] And so, you know, growing up in, like, the 70s and into the 80s, I mythologized the comedy store, too.

[394] And actually the first time I went down to the comedy stores, it's like, yeah, 82, 83.

[395] I mean, I saw it forever, driving past it.

[396] And finally, I brought up to a buddy of mine, hey, let's just go.

[397] And so we show up at the comedy store around like 1130, 12 at night or whatever.

[398] It's like, say, 82 or 83.

[399] We walk in the comedy store on stage, never seen them before in my life.

[400] never heard of him before and her dice clay that's who's on stage wow when we come walking in and he's doing hickory dickery doc yeah you know and he's doing his full like dice clay routine and then the number one thing like whoa he'll never get on carson with that you know boy he'll never get on carson with that you know boy that was the whole thing oh it's like what you were saying about well they won't let you do that okay well he'll never get on carson with that shit all right that was like the whole thing so he comes on and paul rodrigus comes on who I'd seen and stuff.

[401] And then, like, a few other guys come on.

[402] And then it gets to be towards the end of the show.

[403] And then you hear in the audience, Bring on the beast.

[404] Bring on the beast.

[405] Okay, everybody, here we go.

[406] Last person of the night.

[407] You love him?

[408] You can't live without them.

[409] Ladies and gentlemen, Sam Kenneson.

[410] And I never heard of Sam Keneson before.

[411] And he walked up there.

[412] Last guy on the last guy on the last guy on the last.

[413] lineup.

[414] And I've never laughed harder in my life as I laughed at Sam Kennyson doing his you know, routine at the close of the comedy store.

[415] It was, I mean, like I lost, I mean, I spilled drinks.

[416] It was like I lost control of myself.

[417] And it was so great.

[418] I came back the next night to see if the Sam Kinnison thing was just like a, did it even happen?

[419] Right.

[420] Did it even happen?

[421] And then, yeah, there it was.

[422] It happened.

[423] That's the guy.

[424] And I laughed just as much at the shit, a second time.

[425] I was like, my God, like I wanted to follow this guy, like a religious leader.

[426] I thought it was the most eye -opening stuff I had ever seen.

[427] And I was coming from a similar place.

[428] Women had treated me like shit.

[429] I was like, fuck yeah, man. This guy's right.

[430] And, you know, I was just two steps away from being an insect.

[431] All right, you know, so it was like, the Sam Kenneson was speaking the word, man. I found about Kenison from a girl that I work with at a health club.

[432] I worked at this place called the Boston Athletic Club.

[433] It was a gym in South Boston.

[434] I was teaching people how to lift weights.

[435] And there was this girl who was, I think she played volleyball or something.

[436] She was like this big, like, bold personality.

[437] She was hilarious.

[438] She was a really funny girl.

[439] And she was telling me, because she knew I liked comedy.

[440] and I never even thought about doing comedy back then.

[441] This was 90, I was, or 1986, so I was 19 years old.

[442] And she tells me about this HBO special that she saw with this guy, Sam Kinnison.

[443] And then she does, we're out in the parking lot of this health club.

[444] And she starts doing the routine of him paying money to, like he had a routine about homosexual necrophiliacs paying money.

[445] Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[446] To the mortuaries to spend time with the friends.

[447] precious male corpses.

[448] So here's this girl.

[449] Oh, this is great.

[450] Yeah.

[451] This girl's lying on her stomach in the parking lot going, oh, you mean life keeps fucking in the ass even after you're dead?

[452] It never ends.

[453] It never ends.

[454] Oh, oh!

[455] So she's doing the impression of it.

[456] I'm howling at her impression of it.

[457] And then I got to a video store and I got a copy of the VHS.

[458] Okay, well, dude, okay, I was into him a year and a half before that.

[459] All right, you're talking, he's already back mainstream.

[460] He's already done his HBO special by then.

[461] This was like no one's giving him shit other than Mitzie.

[462] Yeah, you were there at the ground floor.

[463] Fucking year and a fucking half before he did edit any TV.

[464] Do you know the origin story of Sam Kinnison?

[465] Yeah, I do, yeah.

[466] No, I'm pretty familiar.

[467] It's a normal guy.

[468] And he got hit by a car when he was a kid and got brain damage.

[469] But he was like the weird of, like Marjo Garner.

[470] He was like the weird evangelist kid.

[471] Uh -huh.

[472] Yeah, but his brother wrote about it in Brother Sam.

[473] His brother Bill wrote a book about it.

[474] He was like a totally normal kid, gets hit by a car.

[475] And then he's just this wild, unstoppable.

[476] That I didn't know.

[477] Okay, that I didn't know.

[478] Well, there's quite a few people like that.

[479] Roseanne Barr is another one.

[480] Hit by a car when she was 15.

[481] She spent nine months afterwards in a mental institution.

[482] She couldn't count anymore.

[483] She used to be, like, excellent at math.

[484] She got hit by a car, spent nine months in a mental institution, couldn't count anymore.

[485] The brain was completely fucked.

[486] No, I had a friend got hit by a car, and then when she came to, she couldn't speak English.

[487] She could only speak Spanish.

[488] Whoa.

[489] Could you speak Spanish before that?

[490] Yeah, I think she had like, you know, just high school Spanish.

[491] But then all of a sudden, like, for, you know, I think four days or so, she could only access the Spanish part of her brain.

[492] Wow.

[493] Wow.

[494] Well, something happens to people when they get brain injuries where they get really impulsive and wild.

[495] And they're reckless.

[496] And that's what became of Kinnisett.

[497] Yeah, yeah.

[498] He became this wild, reckless, like, maniac.

[499] and it literally came out of a brain injury.

[500] It's amazing.

[501] I mean, it's terrible.

[502] You don't want anybody to have a brain injury.

[503] But on the other hand, that's the only way to create a kinesis.

[504] That's the only way that, yeah, exactly.

[505] That's the only, that's where the lab experiment starts.

[506] It's hard for people to understand how revolutionary that guy was.

[507] Because when I was a kid, he was the first guy that ever made me think about comedy, like, that I could do comedy.

[508] Because I always thought comedy was those guys you saw on the Tonight Show.

[509] Yeah, yeah.

[510] Where they, you know.

[511] Well, it's like the first real official.

[512] thing he did outside of the comedy store was he did one of those like comedy tapes that Rodney Dangerfield hosted.

[513] Yeah.

[514] So it was like him and Roseanne Barr and then like a couple of other Bob Nelson doing his boxer dude.

[515] Yeah, yeah.

[516] You know, and then you know so like oh my God, this is the dude!

[517] This is the dude!

[518] This before he gets his own special.

[519] He just does Rodney special.

[520] Yeah, no, I remember that very well.

[521] So we had all those tapes, man. I watched all that stuff.

[522] I remember you used to on Comedy Central.

[523] You would do the you're little non -sequiters.

[524] Jesus Christ, you remember those?

[525] Yeah, when you had hair and you did the little non -securators talking about, yeah, okay, I'm, I can pretend I'm sitting in front of a brick wall.

[526] Yeah.

[527] I'm talking about L .A. and New York.

[528] Yeah, that's like 93 or 92 or something like that.

[529] That's crazy.

[530] No, I was just like, I did Mark Maren show.

[531] Hey, I remember you.

[532] Short attention span theater, right?

[533] Wow.

[534] Yeah.

[535] Penn Juliet, doing all the promo voices.

[536] Pengillette, yeah, yeah Pengillette, Juliet.

[537] God, it's amazing that you were at the store in 82.

[538] Was prior there at all?

[539] No, he would make personal, he would make, it was always a big deal.

[540] Him and Robin Williams would just show up every once in a while.

[541] No, it was like boring Paul Muni, you know, doing his fucking 45 -minute act, blowing down everybody else, right, who wanted to come on.

[542] And, um, uh, um, um, um, Tom Brogan, all right, the guy who, he had a show.

[543] I think he was one of the producers on the Tonight Show at a certain point.

[544] Jimmy Brogan.

[545] Jimmy Brogan.

[546] Yeah, that's right.

[547] Jimmy Brogan would come on.

[548] Jeff Altman.

[549] Oh, wow.

[550] Yeah, would come on doing their bit.

[551] Carrie Snow.

[552] It was the time of Carrie Snow, which I always won whatever, whatever happened to her.

[553] I thought she was really funny.

[554] She was really funny.

[555] I don't know.

[556] I don't know what happened to her.

[557] Yeah, that's an amazing time.

[558] That was probably literally the heyday of the comedy store where you were there.

[559] Yeah.

[560] Well, it was definitely the new generation was coming around.

[561] And I talked with Jim Carrey once, and he was like, no, he goes, no, that was the time when I knew I could kill with impressions.

[562] But I knew I had to get away from impressions.

[563] And, like, Sam Kenneson was my best friend.

[564] And he was, like, one teaching me, telling me I got to stop doing impressions.

[565] And Mitzie would go, what are you talking about?

[566] You're the king of impressions.

[567] And I thought, well, okay, so I'm the king of impressions.

[568] So what, the best I can hope for is Rich Little?

[569] I want more than that.

[570] But that means going up on the comedy store and bombing, knowing that if I just did one impression, I'd win the audience completely over.

[571] And so, like, when you know you have killer material in your pocket and you refuse to use it and you refuse, but you're going to, you know, painfully recreate yourself.

[572] She had a few guys like that that were guitar acts.

[573] Oh, uh -huh.

[574] That were, they would only sing songs on stage.

[575] And then she eventually was telling them, hey, put the fucking guitar down.

[576] Just go up there and do stand -up.

[577] You can do stand -up.

[578] And a lot of them just went into a funk and didn't know how to handle it.

[579] Because here you got Mitzie Shore telling you to put the fucking guitar down.

[580] But you know that the guitar is your safety plan.

[581] Right, yeah, yeah.

[582] Yeah.

[583] It never worked out.

[584] I don't know anybody who ever put the guitar down and just...

[585] And then just killed it, yeah.

[586] Maybe I don't know.

[587] Maybe they did it.

[588] But you see, okay, and that's that time.

[589] If you look at the comedy, okay, say six years before that, you know, like the Gary Shandling time, you know, you know, Brian Regan time and everything.

[590] And then it was like everybody was like getting on Make Me Laugh.

[591] Right.

[592] Well, Brian Regan was way later.

[593] Yeah, yeah.

[594] But it's the style.

[595] No, Brian Regan is the time we're talking about.

[596] No, no, no. the time we're talking about in 80s right well Brian Regan really made it um after the 90s oh really yeah but he'd been around he'd been around I'm sure I'd seen him on my Caroline's comedy hour like an 88 yeah yeah for sure but he really kind of made it Brian Regan kind of made it I never know he actually ever really made it I always just like the guy well he's made it as a big act as a stand -up comedy act but like never really made it in television and films and stuff like that yeah but he's he's made it in television and films and stuff like He sells out, like, Red Rocks in Denver all the time.

[597] Well, good for him.

[598] He sells out giant theaters.

[599] Yeah, he does really well.

[600] But he's one of those guys like Sebastian, like Sebastian Manascolco, who sells out these, like, giant -ass places.

[601] And then you find out about it.

[602] You're like, what?

[603] Like, Sebastian sells out Madison Square Garden, like, multiple shows in a row.

[604] Yeah, I know, yeah.

[605] Well, again, talking about Dice.

[606] He was the first comedian to do that.

[607] Yes.

[608] Yes.

[609] He was the first.

[610] I mean, him in that day selling out Madison Square Garden three times in a row, I mean, like for a three -night engagement, that was unheard of.

[611] Unheard of.

[612] Yeah, nobody did that.

[613] He sold out Nassau, Coliseum, giant arenas.

[614] And then like he did one of the greatest comedy albums of all time.

[615] The two...

[616] Day the Laughter to die.

[617] The Day the Lafter.

[618] One of the greatest comedy albums of all time.

[619] I'm so glad you liked that.

[620] At the height of his controversy, he does a two album set with a hostile fucking audience.

[621] And bombs.

[622] And bombs.

[623] And bombs.

[624] With people leaving.

[625] You're a fucking asshole.

[626] Yeah, get out of here, you fucking bitch.

[627] This guy got up.

[628] I'll never forget that he goes, You're about as funny as a glass of milk.

[629] Like, that's what he said to him.

[630] And Dice is laughing.

[631] I mean, that is just the greatest comedy album ever at the height of his fame.

[632] And I'm pretty sure Rick Rubin produced it.

[633] Yeah, I think he did.

[634] And so these two wild motherfuckers said, go ahead, release it.

[635] Release it.

[636] Well, Dice has always been this guy that's taken crazy chances like that.

[637] Like very few people would have the confidence or have the understanding of who they are to do that.

[638] Yeah, yeah.

[639] And to know that that is like a lot of people are not going to like it.

[640] Well, yeah.

[641] Probably a lot of people bought those CDs and we're like, what the fuck is this?

[642] Right.

[643] Because he shows up unannounced at Dangerfields Nightclub in New York City.

[644] There's fucking no one in the audience, because no one knows he's going to be there.

[645] And he's doing this complete unprepared set.

[646] He has no material.

[647] He's just fucking around.

[648] And sometimes he's got his John Travolta impersonation, waiting for the end.

[649] I know I can do the staying alive thing and that I'll wrap up the audience.

[650] Well, that was his thing.

[651] He used to be Andrew Silverstein.

[652] And he had all these impressions that he would do.

[653] He would do Travolta.

[654] He would do Stallone.

[655] And then at the end, he would do this Dice Man character.

[656] The Dice Man character was so good.

[657] He abandoned all the other shit and just kind of became the Dice Man. That must have been wild, though, to be there at that time.

[658] No, to walk into the place and he's on stage.

[659] Yeah.

[660] Full black leather jacket.

[661] Wow.

[662] Doing the whole cigarette bit.

[663] Wow.

[664] And doing his I Dream of Jeannie jokes.

[665] Yeah.

[666] I dream of Jeannie.

[667] Yeah, and everyone was like, okay, master, what wish can I grant you?

[668] Okay.

[669] Make your tongue 10 feet long and stick it up my ass.

[670] That era of Hollywood, like to be there at that time, it was a tumultuous time, too.

[671] It was like so much wild shit was happening and for you to be a young guy to be in that scene and see it all go down.

[672] Like, just be a young guy back there.

[673] How much of that affected the way you viewed things, the way you viewed your work and the things that you made?

[674] Well, I don't know if it had any, like, you know, it was just exciting.

[675] The 90s were fun.

[676] You know, the 90s, now, the 90s look like the 70s part too.

[677] I don't know if I thought about that then.

[678] Right.

[679] But I think about that now.

[680] And, yeah, it was a lot of fun.

[681] You know, and I was still pretty young.

[682] I was like at my beginning 30s and my 20s, because I was so broke, like working minimum wage jobs, I didn't like have as much fun in my 20s as I could have had.

[683] Well, I made up for it in my 30s.

[684] When you brought back John Travolta, that was a big deal, too.

[685] because you had this enormous movie and that was like one of the first times I can recall, correct me if I'm wrong, where a guy falls out like he's not a big star anymore.

[686] It's gone, it's over.

[687] And then you put him in a massive movie and he's really fucking good.

[688] He's really fucking good.

[689] It's interesting.

[690] It's weird.

[691] He's a heroin addict who's an assassin who also can dance and him and Uma Thurma on the dance floor.

[692] You changed his whole life.

[693] Yeah.

[694] Now it happened that way.

[695] Was it a resistance to try to put him in that movie?

[696] Oh, of course.

[697] I mean, you know, the only thing he had done that had made any noise in a long time was, you know, those look who's talking movies.

[698] Yeah.

[699] And, again, there's this thing that's floating around, like, you know, my initial cast list for Pulp Fiction is kind of floating around on the Internet.

[700] Somebody got a hold of it and printed it out.

[701] And, you know, it's a...

[702] It's true, but there's a story behind it.

[703] It's not just a normal cast list.

[704] The idea, I remember my agent telling me, okay, so you're getting a deal.

[705] So one of the things that you do when you get a deal at the time of it was with TriStar.

[706] And it was like you write down everybody you can think of who would be more or less you think right for the character.

[707] and you write down everybody.

[708] And if they sign off on it, well, then you can cast any of those people you want.

[709] So I thought of everybody who could even possibly play the roles.

[710] And I just wrote like a whole shitload of names.

[711] Not that I was even going to consider it.

[712] It was like, no, throw more names on there.

[713] And that's just, you know, once they sign off on it, this is this talent pool I have to choose from.

[714] So I just wrote down a whole shitload of names of people that I thought.

[715] you know, in the wildest stretch of imagination could be okay for the role if I, if it all worked out.

[716] And, um, and then it came time to sign off on it.

[717] And then they were like, okay, we want you to take two names off the list and we'll sign off on it.

[718] And I go, oh, woohoo.

[719] And they go, we want you to take off William Peterson and we want you to take off John Travolta.

[720] Wow.

[721] And I go, well, I'm not going to take off John Travolta.

[722] Now, this was actually before I even wanted John Travolta.

[723] I wrote the part of Vincent from Michael Madsen.

[724] It was his role.

[725] And I'd written Pumpkin and Honey Bunny for Tim Roth and Amanda Plummer.

[726] And I'd written The Wolf for Harvey Cattell.

[727] And I had written Vincent Vega for Michael Madsen.

[728] And then I've been writing the script.

[729] for not quite a year, but like, say, eight or nine months.

[730] Two weeks before I'm finished with it, Michael Madsen accepts the role in Wyatt Earp, the Kevin Costner, Lawrence Kasden movie.

[731] And so he's not available.

[732] And at the time, I was thinking maybe at John Travolta Moore for the Eric Stoltz part.

[733] Not that I would have dressed him like Eric Stoltz, but he was that guy.

[734] And so then I get together with John and we have lunch and he's a really great guy.

[735] And I start thinking, well, you know, he could be a real legitimate replacement for Michael Madsen as Vincent.

[736] I can see him being a really, really good Vincent.

[737] And so I say I want to cast him.

[738] And now it's not TriStar anymore.

[739] Now it's Merrimax.

[740] And Harvey Cotillas, John Chavalta, but he just does straight to video movies.

[741] movies, you know, and that talking baby shit, you know, uh, uh, you can have anybody you want.

[742] You know, like, you could get Sean Penn if you wanted.

[743] Now, he's a great actor.

[744] Uh, you could get a, um, uh, and at the time, and he wasn't, uh, at the time, he was like, Daniel Day Lewis would do this.

[745] And, you know, he doesn't do anything, but he would do this.

[746] Mm. And it's one thing to actually push some guy who's not hot, but it's another thing to, like, a guy's hot and wants to.

[747] to do it and then you're pushing him aside you know yeah you know push another dude and I just literally just said I go well look um here's the thing that I had in my side while the rest of the industry was telling me I was crazy was I you know one of my favorite writers has always been Pauline Kale and Pauline Kale was always a huge John Travolta fan even when she didn't like the movie she liked him and uh they had had had a piece in the Los Angeles Times, maybe five years earlier, about what the fuck happened to Travolta?

[748] And they interview her.

[749] And at the end, they go, well, can John Travolta come back?

[750] And then she said, well, he needs to come back.

[751] Movies need him.

[752] And so I just, knowing that I had Pauline Kale on my side, I could literally face down any Hollywood fuck about it.

[753] You know, that was like my Siegfried sword.

[754] And they were all dragons.

[755] And I had the word of Paul and Kale in my back pocket.

[756] She backed me up.

[757] And so I said, well, look, Harvey Harvey, you need to watch John Travolta in Brian De Palma's blowout.

[758] And if you don't think that's a great performance, then maybe we shouldn't be making this movie together, and I should make it with somebody else.

[759] Wow.

[760] And then all of a sudden, it was okay to have Travolta.

[761] Well, is there another silent moment?

[762] Yeah.

[763] Just remember Miramax said it's okay to use John Travolta.

[764] Exactly, yeah.

[765] Well, God damn, you were right, though.

[766] I mean, because there was something about seeing him in the movie, like, wow, fucking John Travolta.

[767] Because it, like I said, the movie was so odd and so special that it was an added element of having this guy that was supposed to be done.

[768] And now all of a sudden he's back.

[769] And not only he back, he's fucking sensational.

[770] Yeah, and there was this weird kind of things.

[771] I don't think that kind of comeback had happened in a bit.

[772] had it ever happened Well I'm sure they're Oh yeah Like you know Case can be made it happen With Frank Sinatra With from here to eternity And like a couple of other things Or like a You know a character actor comes back He's been doing crappy stuff But then he has like a nice role Like Martin Landau and Tucker Now he's now doing stuff again Right You know Where he had been doing exploitation movies before But not like No the guy becomes a big star again Yeah And And, but there was this thing.

[773] I remember Manola Dargis even writing about it at the time.

[774] And she goes, has a comeback ever been this much fun?

[775] It was sort of like a thing.

[776] Yeah, we always used to like John Travolta.

[777] Yeah.

[778] And then we just kind of let it die on the vine.

[779] And now we're seeing it.

[780] And yes, we were right to like him before.

[781] He's really charming in this.

[782] He's really interesting.

[783] Yeah, it wasn't about ability.

[784] You enjoyed it.

[785] Yes.

[786] It was a perception issue.

[787] Like, you perceived him as being in a category of actors that had been relegated to, Like you said, off, you know, these videos.

[788] Well, there was an interesting thing because remember we screened Pulp Fiction at this festival in Italy, the Taramina Film Festival.

[789] And the people who were on the – so it was my movie and I was part of the jury.

[790] And so the whole jury kind of watched my movie and was like – have this big amphitheater that was made a thousand years ago.

[791] So it's all being projected outside and we're all sitting on these stone steps, bleachers.

[792] And so as like Adam Goyan, the Canadian filmmaker and John Waters and Pedro Motevar, they're all there.

[793] And they're all watching my movie for the first time.

[794] And then like the Jack Rabbit Slim scene starts happening.

[795] And then all of a sudden, you know, they say, yes, they're going to join the twist contest.

[796] And they walk up on the stage.

[797] And then all of a sudden, John Travolta starts taking off his shoes.

[798] And then they're all like, oh my God, he's going to dance.

[799] Holy shit, John Travolta's going to fucking dance in the movie.

[800] And then he dances.

[801] Oh, my God, this is the greatest thing ever.

[802] Right, because people forgot how fucking good of a dancer he was, Saturday Night Feeder.

[803] Go back and watch that movie.

[804] Wow.

[805] When you finish that film, like, how long is it editing, like, how long does it take from last scene filmed, that's a wrap, to the editing process of putting together a film like that with all the intricate people ask me that a lot and I always kind of just have amnesia about how long it takes I think it's something like you know three or four months something like that wow you know to edit it all together do you lose your your vision in that time it's like it seems like no it just gets better and better and better but what I'm thinking is like is it hard to see what you're seeing like because you're so close to it is it hard to see it fresh no to see it how a person going to see it if they're watching it for the first time?

[806] No, it's, no, it's, it's really fun.

[807] After shooting the movie, it's like, it's really fun to actually start playing with the edit, you know, and then, like, you know, using the scenes that you like and the takes that you like and building it.

[808] And whenever you do a good cinematic sequence, then, you know, for the next, like, two weeks, you start the day looking at the scene that you did that you liked.

[809] Okay, let's just, okay, let's watch that car chase again, or let's watch that music montage again, okay, that gets her blood up.

[810] Okay, we were the guys who did that.

[811] Let's do this.

[812] Is it true that you have a 20 -hour cut of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood?

[813] No, that's not.

[814] She was exaggerated.

[815] These motherfuckers.

[816] I was excited.

[817] I was like, maybe you'll put it out on Netflix.

[818] No, it's like, you know, if I were to cut the film, if I were to cut the film where, like, time was not an issue, just, you know, not to throw every piece of shit in there, all right?

[819] But, okay, if time is not an issue and I can use all the footage that I shot and don't have to worry about time, it would probably be about, like, you know.

[820] three hours and 20 minutes or something like that oh yeah interesting have you ever thought of doing that i might yeah i might that would be well and the and you know and um there's all kinds of stuff in the book that i didn't shoot or anything that i came up with later or i or i just never never even bother shit because i know it would never be in the film but uh but if i were to do that after you've read the book you would seem like oh wow i guess this is like a movie version of the book because there's all these sequences that are in the book that weren't in the movie.

[821] But you wrote the book after you wrote the screenplay.

[822] Yeah.

[823] No, do you, when you have this, like, how do you write?

[824] Do you have a storyboard where you have these ideas?

[825] Do you just kind of go on the fly and go wherever your creativity takes you?

[826] Well, sort of.

[827] I mean, like, I write from the, you know, when I write my scripts, you know, I start with the first scene and then just go through the story.

[828] Now, normally, when I do a movie, Yeah, I have more or less the story worked out.

[829] I mean, like, okay, say, okay, and also because I'm dealing in genre and subgenre, so that even dictates a bit.

[830] I mean, if I'm writing Kill Bill, I pretty much know at the end of the movie she's going to kill Bill.

[831] All right, but exactly how she's going to kill Bill and how we feel about it at the end.

[832] Well, that can be, that's left open for conjecture.

[833] Now I need to get to there, but I can assume that that's going to happen.

[834] And in glorious bastards, I figure it's going to end with the big mission.

[835] Now, exactly what goes down on the big mission is to be revealed.

[836] But that is, but it's a genre movie, and it's a bunch of guys on a mission movie, and we're heading in that direction.

[837] So it's like a, so normally I have it worked out, but what I've learned through trial and error, or just, I guess, from experience, what I've learned not trial and error, but from experience, what I've learned is that trial and error, but from experience, what I've learned is that.

[838] little mapping out of more or less what happens in the story really only applies to the middle of the story because by the time you get to the middle of the story well now you know so much more before you ever started putting pen to paper i mean now i know who these people are now now i am these people these characters i am them they are me now i'm i've i truly know who they are and now i've invested in this world to such a degree that the hope hope is by the 40 % mark or the 50 % mark that the characters just take it from me. And then from that point on, they're writing the story.

[839] Wow.

[840] So you're just essentially thinking through their eyes or thinking through their minds and behaving as them and just knowing who they are.

[841] I am a storyteller.

[842] So if I have to steer them in a direction I think is more interesting or more exciting, well, then obviously I can do that.

[843] I have the power to do that.

[844] But I'm trying not to do that.

[845] I figure if they want to do it, they're right.

[846] That is truth talking to me. And I figure they should know best.

[847] Yeah.

[848] And this process, like, how are you doing this?

[849] Are you alone in a room?

[850] Are you in the dark?

[851] Like, how do you write?

[852] You have a specific way?

[853] Yeah, it all changed about more or less around writing in glorious bastards.

[854] It all changed.

[855] Before that, I was very much like an amateur, mad little writer.

[856] Like I mostly wrote at night, all night long, go to bed in the morning.

[857] Or if I was writing during the day, I probably was writing in a restaurant or a bar.

[858] Go to a restaurant and order some shit and drink a lot of coffee and be there for three hours with all my shit laid out.

[859] somewhere around doing reservoir dogs that changed and i started writing during the daytime reservoirs reservoirs no i didn't i didn't mean reservoirs i meant in glorious bastards sorry about that good good catch um around in glorious bastards i started uh writing during the daytime where i get up and you know it's like you know so around 10 30 or 11 o 'clock or 11 30 i would sit down and write and uh like a normal work day and i would sit down and i would uh right until four, five, six, or seven.

[860] Somewhere around there, I would stop.

[861] And then I have a pool and I keep it heated, so it's nice.

[862] And I'd go into my, so if I finished, okay, so either I'm not finished with a sequence or I've just finished a sequence and I've got to figure out what to do next.

[863] So if I haven't finished a sequence, then I'd hop in my pool and just kind of float around in the warm water and think about everything I've just written and, you know, know, how I can make it better or what else can happen as far as before the scene's over.

[864] And then a lot of shit would come to me, literally, a lot of things would come to me. And then I'd get out and I would make little notes on that, but not do it.

[865] And that would be my work for tomorrow.

[866] Or if I just finished a scene, all right, I would think, okay, I'd go back over it in my head in the pool and think about it.

[867] Now, okay, now what's the next scene?

[868] Okay, now what's next?

[869] And then I figure out a few things and make notes and that's my work for the next day.

[870] And that's ended up becoming this really, you know, really enjoyable, really kind of lovely way to write.

[871] As opposed to all -nighters.

[872] As opposed to the all -night.

[873] I can still do that from every once in a while.

[874] But I just like the idea of writing all day and then stopping and then having a meditative process about what I'm what I've done, what I'm going to do, and then just chuck it out and, you know, watch a movie or go and have dinner and do whatever.

[875] And what caused this shift?

[876] I don't know.

[877] I'm not sure.

[878] I think Frank you know I think it was just actually becoming more professional I think that first thing is kind of what you think you're supposed to do right as a writer by this point in time I'd written enough scripts and I was definitely a professional and I just started you know having a work day and do you have like say if you start a film like Kill Bill do you what how do you do you have like an inspiration one day and you write a note like how does how does something like that get going actually become a project.

[879] Oh, well, no, I'd came up with, no, I'd came up with the idea and came up with, like, who the deadly vipers would be.

[880] And I knew I kind of wanted each of them to more or less represent some subgenre in exploitation cinema or action cinema.

[881] So it's as if Uma is fighting her way through genre cinema.

[882] Oh.

[883] Yeah, that's a fucking amazing movie, both of them.

[884] Yeah, that's one of my favorite films I've done.

[885] Yeah, it's one of my favorite films you've done, too.

[886] And the violence is so fun.

[887] because it's so cartoonish almost it's so crazy no it's very shogun assassin yeah yeah and to do it what was the motivation to do it into two films well it uh it wasn't meant to be done that way it was meant to be one big giant movie and um and so through the whole thing i'm like okay i cut this down to three hours cut this down to two and a half hours how am i going to do it and we're shooting all They're like, well, it's going to work out.

[888] It has to work out.

[889] But boy, it's going to be sad.

[890] It's going to be rough.

[891] But, you know, it's got to be done.

[892] And then at some point, after we kind of finished the main shoot, we were doing little pickup scenes that we needed to do something on.

[893] And then Harvey Weinstein visited the set.

[894] And he was just talking to me just before I was getting ready to shoot a scene.

[895] He goes, yeah, Quentin, you know, I really.

[896] I'm just going to murder you to cut some of this.

[897] You know, what about releasing it in two parts?

[898] And that way you can keep everything in it.

[899] And he said that.

[900] And then like the AD goes, okay, we're ready for you, Quinn.

[901] And so I go and I shoot whatever I was shooting and I shoot one, two or three takes.

[902] And when I'm done, I go back to Harvey.

[903] Okay, if we do that, this is how we do it.

[904] That da -da -da -da -da -da -da -da -da -da -da -da.

[905] He goes, well, I hear you say, let's do it that way.

[906] I go, okay, that's great.

[907] Now, Uma Thurman will tell you that I always meant to do it in two parts.

[908] I just waited for Harvey to have the idea.

[909] And there might be something to that.

[910] But I couldn't count on that.

[911] But Quentin always knew it was going to be two parts, but he knew he couldn't have the idea.

[912] It had to be Harvey's great idea.

[913] Did you always know that it was going to be her?

[914] Did you write that movie for her?

[915] No, well, not only that.

[916] She got pregnant just before I was getting ready to do the movie with her son, Levan.

[917] And everyone was pressuring me to go and cast somebody else.

[918] But I was like, hey, you know, you're right fistful of dollars for Eastwood.

[919] Eastwood gets pregnant.

[920] You wait for Eastwood.

[921] Yeah.

[922] It's only nine months.

[923] Yeah.

[924] Well, then how long after giving birth did she do the film?

[925] Like, when she started training within like three months of kicking out the baby.

[926] That's crazy.

[927] That's because it's so physical.

[928] Yeah.

[929] How much of what she was doing was her and how much of it was a stunt people?

[930] Because she did a lot of shit, too.

[931] Yeah, no. She did.

[932] If you look at the movie, you can see, look, you know, I mean, anything that required her to do like somersaults or anything like that, that's pretty much Zoe Bell.

[933] All right.

[934] You know, but, you know, but actual the physical, the physical fighting with the sword and all that, that's her.

[935] You know, and the, you know, any crash and smash stuff.

[936] Is Zoe Bell the girl who's in death proof?

[937] Yeah.

[938] So you took Uma Thurman's stunt double and turned her into an actress.

[939] And made her an actress.

[940] Yeah.

[941] That's fucking incredible.

[942] Just because you thought she was cool?

[943] Well, yeah, she was cool, all right?

[944] She was like this really wonderful presence.

[945] She had started in a documentary called Double Dare, where it was like they followed Jeannie Epper, who was kind of this like the patron saint of female stunt people, because the Epper family is like the Flying Lewindas, all right, of the stunt world.

[946] And Jeannie Epper was Linda Carter's double on Wonder Woman.

[947] and Zoe was Lucy Lawless's double on Zena.

[948] So they kind of do this movie where it kind of shows their trajectory.

[949] And Zoe's just a very charming, very funny, effervescent person.

[950] And so when you see the documentary, you see that all that she has in real life just completely comes through in the movie.

[951] And people fall in love with her in the film.

[952] And so I knew that if I wrote a part that featured that, and I, I, I, I, I, you know, guided it that that exact same quality of Zoe would come across.

[953] But with Zoe, we could do anything we fucking want.

[954] And like Jackie Chan, Zoe will do it on camera and you'll know that it's Zoe.

[955] That it's Zoe doing it.

[956] Right.

[957] Right.

[958] And Zoe was sort of like, you know, well, look, my whole thing is if I'm doubling for Uma, if I'm doubling for Sharon Stone or whatever, you know, if it's, I want to do everything.

[959] Because, okay, in those cases, if it's, if it's It's like Sharon Stone's foot on the bumper of the car.

[960] Well, that's going to be Zoe's foot.

[961] Right.

[962] If it's like Sharon Stone's hand holding the belt, it's going to be Zoe's hand holding the belt.

[963] Okay, so now, now it's me. No, I want my foot on the bumper and I want my hand on the belt.

[964] I want to do all the inserts.

[965] I want to do everything.

[966] And everyone knows it's me. So when you guys filmed the scenes in death proof where she was hanging on the hood of the challenger, she's really driving down the road hanging on the hood of a challenger?

[967] Oh, yeah, going like 70 miles and out.

[968] Holy shit.

[969] Yeah, we're never like, people are like, I heard it's on a podcast.

[970] Well, I heard they were going 40 miles on.

[971] Bull fucking shit.

[972] We were going 70 miles an hour at slowest.

[973] Wow.

[974] It was between, it was between 60 miles an hour at slowest.

[975] It was between 60, 70 and 90.

[976] There's certain scenes like when she's turned around and she's holding on to the vents.

[977] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[978] I'm fucking cringe like this.

[979] This is fucking wild, man. How the hell did she do that?

[980] Well, the thing about it is she had a little help.

[981] But one of the things that she had was she had a, look, it's, it helps her if everything goes well.

[982] It hurts her if things go sideways.

[983] She had a metal cable that was attached to her, like, you know, basically like the button of her pants.

[984] And that cable went through the hood back into the back seat.

[985] And then there was a stunt guy holding the cable.

[986] Oh, Jesus.

[987] You know, so it's not an automatic thing.

[988] No, he's holding the cable.

[989] So he's giving her more, he's giving her more cable when she needs it, and he's holding tight when she doesn't.

[990] But if the car flipped over or if the car did anything like that, that cable would have killed her.

[991] Right.

[992] She's attached to the car now.

[993] Yeah, she's attached to the car.

[994] And you are doing these scenes where you're banging the challenger against the charger.

[995] And she's hanging on while this is happening.

[996] Absolutely.

[997] And when we're doing it, it's like we're doing it, yeah, it's like 60, 70, 80, or 90 miles an hour.

[998] And if you look at it, if the camera is in front of the car, which it was a lot of times, if the camera's in front of the car, well, that means the car, if, you know, if the cameras, if Zoe is going 80 miles an hour, that means the camera car is going 90 miles an hour.

[999] If Zoe is going 90 miles an hour That means the camera car is going 110 miles an hour Oh my God And you're doing this in old fucking cars too Oh yeah yeah Don't handle that good Yeah Oh they Those cars were pretty good Alright you know We bought like we bought like Like three chargers And made a Frankenstein monster Of the best of them Yeah but even if you make the best I have a lot of those cars Yeah yeah The old cars just Even if you do the best job you can Uh huh Changing the suspension And they're still, they handle like dog shit.

[1000] Well, it's funny, because it was like on the last day of the car chase, which we had two weeks to do the car chase, on the last day of the car chase, we kept crashing.

[1001] Not with Zoe on the car.

[1002] It was during the later chase.

[1003] Buddy Joe Hooker was the one driving Kurt's car.

[1004] And he kept tipping it over.

[1005] Oh, Jesus Christ.

[1006] And I never got hurt, but it was always like a little scary.

[1007] And then the AD comes in and he goes, I think we kind of need to wrap this.

[1008] I think we've just really been living in the pocket of luxury for two weeks, but like the fact that it's happened three times on this last day, I think it's just we've just burned out our goodwill with the movie gods.

[1009] I think we need to wrap this up.

[1010] Wow.

[1011] How many times did you guys crack?

[1012] Because like how many different challengers did you sit in chargers did you film that with?

[1013] Oh, well, well, we beat the shit out of them and then we had mechanics work on them all night long.

[1014] To try to make them functional.

[1015] Yeah, exactly.

[1016] So they didn't bend the frames or anything like that.

[1017] No, no, no, no, nothing like that.

[1018] God damn, though.

[1019] Did you use a white challenger in sort of an homage to Vanishing Point?

[1020] Oh, yeah, well, they talk about it in the movie.

[1021] They talk about it, that's right.

[1022] That's like the Vanishing Point cover.

[1023] That's right, that's right.

[1024] And why the Kurt Russell character, like, when you have this guy who's killing people with a car.

[1025] Like, where the fuck did that come from?

[1026] Well, that came from the idea at some point.

[1027] I was hanging out with Sean Penn's name drop for a second.

[1028] I was hanging out with Sean Penn, and I was thinking, telling him, well, I think I'm going to change my car.

[1029] I'm going to get a safer car.

[1030] Because, like, you know, life's pretty good.

[1031] I kind of always had this thing that I wasn't going to die before I did what I wanted to do because God didn't put me on earth to not do what I wanted to do.

[1032] However, by that point, I've been doing what I wanted to do for about 10 years.

[1033] So theoretically, okay, he could take me out right now.

[1034] And I will have done my part.

[1035] And so I was saying to Sean, like, I'm thinking about getting a safer car.

[1036] So in case...

[1037] What were you driving at the time?

[1038] Like a geometro or something like that.

[1039] Really?

[1040] It was like my first new car I ever bought.

[1041] So he just kept it?

[1042] Yeah.

[1043] That's hilarious.

[1044] I bought it with, like, my true romance.

[1045] It's hilarious that he decided to get something safer, not better, not cooler.

[1046] Yeah, no, safer, safer, safer.

[1047] And he goes, well, you don't need to buy a fucking bobo, you know, in order to do that.

[1048] Just buy any car you want and give it to a stunt team and have them death -proof it.

[1049] And then you're ready to go.

[1050] Boom.

[1051] That got in my mind.

[1052] Okay, all right.

[1053] Death -proof a car.

[1054] Death -proof a car.

[1055] And then I've always liked the slasher film genre And so then I kind of thought of like my version of a slasher movie Except like the guy doesn't have a knife and he's slashing up all the girls He just kills him all with his car that he can live through And then like he heals up and nine months later he does it to another group of girls When he did that in the first one that collision is so horrific that head -on collision How did you do that?

[1056] Well, it was funny because I don't like to use CGI or anything.

[1057] And I wanted it to have the effect of the people in the movie, the effect that you have when you see those slow motion of crash test dummies.

[1058] You know, see them jerked and their heads go forward and back and they just get all fucked up.

[1059] Well, I wanted to do that with real people.

[1060] How do you do this with real people?

[1061] people.

[1062] And so I don't like to use CGI, but I figured, well, if any time there would be a plight for CGI would be this because I can't do that to real people.

[1063] But K &B effects by Greg Nicotero, the mastermind behind the Walking Dead series.

[1064] He just knows how much I hate CGI.

[1065] So he planned on doing it with, you know, puppets and full body cast kind of stuff.

[1066] And so he worked it out how to do it in camera, just exactly.

[1067] So it's like, you know, they, you know, took all the girls and, you know, did full body plaster casts on them and painted up Jungle Julia's leg and put the wig on her and did everything.

[1068] And we worked it out how to just do it with dummies that we could rip apart.

[1069] Wow.

[1070] And we did it in slow motion.

[1071] Then we kind of replay it back.

[1072] So it's like, okay, all this is happening.

[1073] All this is happening within like 40 seconds, but because you see what happens to each of them, it takes longer.

[1074] And with the cars, how did you, do you just like have some sort of remote control system?

[1075] Yeah, it was like a remote control system.

[1076] We were like on one end of a street, and then there was like just like a cable that connected the two cars together.

[1077] And they drove without anybody, remote control.

[1078] And so they just, they drove right into each other.

[1079] How fast were they going?

[1080] Like 70.

[1081] Yeah, because somebody was telling me that that was done with stuntmen.

[1082] I'm like, there's no fucking way.

[1083] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1084] It's so much power, the way those cars collide.

[1085] It's one of the greatest head -on car collisions in the history of film.

[1086] Absolutely.

[1087] Because it really is a head -on car collision at speed.

[1088] Yeah.

[1089] And we had to do it twice because we had to do like the one that, you know, the two grills hitting each other and smash.

[1090] Then we had to do it where the car goes up, all right, and rips the roof off and takes the grills face off.

[1091] Yeah.

[1092] Oh, fuck.

[1093] And then it had to roll and roll and roll and roll and do all the stuff we wanted to do.

[1094] How many novas did you destroy?

[1095] making that movie uh not more than like four you know it was just like you know we had four and then you kept working on then you cannibalize the parts from this one or that one it's kind of amazing that after all the movies that have had those cars crashed there's any of those cars still around well i have the uh i have uh i have uh i have the challenger i have like the best of the challenger they they when it came to the what was left they took the best and made a Frankenstein monster for me of the best of the challenger and the charger and I have them in storage.

[1096] What do you do with it?

[1097] Well, it's just sitting in their storage right now.

[1098] What would be kind of cool?

[1099] If somebody wanted to like finance it, I would like do it.

[1100] I have all my vehicles from my movies.

[1101] I mean, even including like, you know, Schultz's tooth wagon from a Django and Chain.

[1102] Do you have the Wolfson, SX?

[1103] No, I don't have that because that was just a rental, all right?

[1104] But I have I have, you know, but I have Max Cherry's little, like, powder blue Seville.

[1105] I have the wagon from the stagecoach from a hateful eight.

[1106] I have the, the Trino from Pulp Fiction.

[1107] I was doing a thing like the cars or the vehicles from Quentin Tarantino's movies and just go on a tour.

[1108] You know, put them all together and you go to a. a place and just lay them all out and people can take photos with them and everything?

[1109] I think that would be fantastic.

[1110] I think people would love that.

[1111] Yeah, if somebody wanted to actually finance the tour and everything and you pay to send the cars over here and there and do the auditoriums that it would have to take place, I'd do that.

[1112] I guarantee you someone's going to hear this and reach out.

[1113] So where would they contact you at?

[1114] What's the best way if someone's...

[1115] William Morris.

[1116] William Morris, okay.

[1117] WME now, right?

[1118] Yeah, yeah.

[1119] It's old habits.

[1120] Yeah, I know, exactly.

[1121] So those films, when you're doing these kind of crazy smash -up films where you have these classic cars, you're doing this kind of stuff, do you – do people ever get angry that you're destroying these – because those cars are, like, beloved, American, iconic vehicles.

[1122] Yeah, when you were – when you're actually buying them from the collector, you don't tell them what you're going to do with like, oh, my God, are you kidding?

[1123] This is like my baby.

[1124] This is my – this is my son, you know.

[1125] Yeah.

[1126] Or my daughter.

[1127] Yeah, so you don't tell them what you're going to use it for.

[1128] But, I mean, just the general public, because people love those cars so much.

[1129] No, no, it's a car chase movie.

[1130] You know, they want to see a good, exciting car chase.

[1131] Yeah.

[1132] When you look back at a film like that, that film is so over the top and so chaotic, too.

[1133] Like, what was that like putting that, like, death -proof together?

[1134] Because it seems, it's such a crazy movie because there's so much.

[1135] dialogue and you're getting to know these people and then they die in horrific terrible ways well it was well one it was like it was i'd been coming to austin by that point in time about 10 years and so i had a whole group of friends in austin i have all these memories and and i've been uh you know later i owned a movie theater called the new beverly cinema and i still own it now and we show movies there a lot oftentimes from my collection but before i had that theater i used to come to Austin and we would have what they'd call QT Film Fest where I bring a bunch of prints over and we usually first we did it at the Dobie when it was the doby was like the cool independent theater out here and then it became the Alamo Draft House back when you know back when it was like on Guadalupe or whatever and we would go and show the movies there and that's how I got to know Tim League and all the Alamo draft house people and we would have like two weeks or a week and a half, all right, of movies.

[1136] And so I got to just really know all the cinema people and all the, you know, just all the cool hipsters in Austin.

[1137] I got very familiar with the place.

[1138] And so when I did death proof, since I made it take place in Austin, that was my chance to do an Austin movie.

[1139] And, you know, and we shot at the Texas chili parlor for like two weeks.

[1140] And then we'd be there all night and shooting at the Texas.

[1141] chili parlor and then we would wrap around the morning time and they're going to open up in about four hours or so and then we would just start drinking the crew that hung around we would just start drinking and you have a little after bar party for two or three hours and then go home and wake up and start it all over again how did you know you're going to use kurt russell was that your first choice no my first choice was mickey rourke really yeah oh wow but uh and it was going to be Mickey Rourke and Mickey wanted to do it but then his agent started like you know his agent said well they need Mickey and so the agents started fucking with us and it was one of those things where goddamn agents yeah it was one of those things where it was like uh um Robert was doing his movie planet terror first so I'm waiting to do mine when he gets done and the agent was was fucking around with us and I was literally okay look here's here's one of the offers you have until nine o 'clock Friday night to accept or reject and they just let that deadline blow by and so that was it and then so then I started thinking well who next and me and Robert Rodriguez had always loved Kurt Russell and we sent him the script and I never met him before I've met him once and he read it and he loved it and then we and they said yes and and we got together and did it, and me and Kurt had a magnificent relationship ever since.

[1142] Kurt Russell's awesome.

[1143] I mean, he's good in so many fucking movies all the way back to the thing, you know?

[1144] Oh, yeah.

[1145] All the way back to Dexter Riley when he was doing the Disney shit.

[1146] But is there, like, a way that you would have contacted Mickey?

[1147] Is there, like, a...

[1148] Is there a protocol for that?

[1149] Like, is there a time where you want someone for your part so much?

[1150] You want this guy.

[1151] Well, I actually knew Mickey at the time.

[1152] He was actually...

[1153] It was like a neighbor.

[1154] He'd actually live.

[1155] lived down the street from me. So, like, I'd even gone down to his house and hung out, you know, a couple of times.

[1156] So it was like, you know, so at first, it was like just calling him up.

[1157] Right.

[1158] And then, like, gave him the script to read and he read it, you know, and he was like, what's icy hot?

[1159] And I go, well, it's the thing he wears on his jacket.

[1160] It's sort of like, it's like Ben Gay.

[1161] Oh, okay.

[1162] And he was talking about getting a pompadour, and that would be a cool thing.

[1163] He had more than that look in a long time.

[1164] and then uh you know but it was just the you know the age was once the agents got in and the agents were just sort of like i mean and the agents were just sort of oh well they need them i mean they need them so we can do what we want oh fucking agents and whenever agents treat that way to me that's when i pull the plug yeah rightly so it's uh it's amazing how much damage they can do right yeah the arsonist disguised as fireman yeah same thing with lawyers yeah well sometimes you need them.

[1165] Are you still committed to this idea that you're going to do 10 films?

[1166] Yeah.

[1167] Why is that?

[1168] Well, okay.

[1169] Because you're at 9.

[1170] I know, yeah.

[1171] You got me talking about retiring.

[1172] When I'm not retiring now, I still have another movie to do.

[1173] Right, but that's only one.

[1174] For me, as a fan, the idea that you're only going to do one more movie, that sucks.

[1175] Well, I appreciate it.

[1176] Thank you.

[1177] And part of it is for you to say that and part of it is to leave you wanting more.

[1178] It's like, I mean, there is, you know, there is one.

[1179] And also, I've been doing it for a long time.

[1180] 30 years is a long fucking time.

[1181] Yes, it is.

[1182] Did you always know from the beginning you were going to do 10?

[1183] No. No, I didn't.

[1184] When did that number come into your head?

[1185] Sometime about like 20 years ago.

[1186] Could you pretend that kill Bill is one?

[1187] No. If I wanted you to just, okay, here's the thing.

[1188] If I were to just stop at once upon a time in Hollywood, I could pretend Kill Bill was two.

[1189] You know Kill Bill's one.

[1190] I consider Kill Bill one.

[1191] Okay, that's right.

[1192] I would consider Kill Bill two if I wanted to just stop at one spot of time.

[1193] it kind of seems like the perfect movie to stop on.

[1194] All right?

[1195] So it's mine to fuck up now from here on that.

[1196] But look, you all know actors, bands, musicians, singers, sports, dudes that you've loved and when they were doing something new it was exciting and it was special and then at a certain point it's not exciting or special anymore.

[1197] It doesn't mean that they're without worth but it's just not the excitement you used to have when blah blah blah had a new movie coming out or blah blah blah had a new album coming out you know it's I want to retire before I lose to Mike before I lose to Leon Spinks right I don't want to lose to Leon Spanx right Muhammad Ali yeah yeah yeah and leave you wanting more and so and so it's not you know it's not like okay well yeah we'll go forget about the shit he's doing now but in the fucking day that guy was the man but you're on top of your game that's what I don't That's a good to the perfect time.

[1198] But why do you think there's going to come a time where you're not on top of your game?

[1199] Because I know about film history, and film directors do not get better as they get older, you know?

[1200] But I have a theory on that.

[1201] I just think that they just get too complacent.

[1202] I don't think you're that guy.

[1203] Look, I don't think I'm that guy either.

[1204] But, you know, it's almost like, you're not saying this, but in the way back.

[1205] Back, back, back, back behind what you're saying is, no, motherfucker, we reject you.

[1206] You don't reject us.

[1207] We'll tell you when you're done.

[1208] You don't tell us when you're done.

[1209] We tell you.

[1210] I love that you have this grand plan because to me, it's very similar to the way that you make films because you've got it all plotted out and you've got an awesome ending to it.

[1211] I kind of like that.

[1212] But as a fan, it bums me out because I don't think, I think you're better than you've I think you've always been awesome.

[1213] But I think once upon a time at Hulu, there's no sign of slipping.

[1214] Like, it's fucking fantastic.

[1215] That's the idea.

[1216] But I don't think you're going to slip.

[1217] To stop when the mic still has a, you know, it has like a 20 pound weight on it and I drop it.

[1218] Bam!

[1219] Not a little fay kind of thing and it bounces up a couple times and rolls away.

[1220] No. Boom.

[1221] Do you have a plan for your life after you're done making films?

[1222] Yeah.

[1223] I've just had my first son with my lovely.

[1224] gorgeous wife and congratulations thank you that's a weird trip isn't it and it's it's terrific he's 15 months old oh wow and he's just he's like he's the most charming human being i've ever met in my life it's a trip it's really it's it's it's it's it's really wild he's he's I mean it's like and um you all the cliches I heard ended up being kind of true where it's like I look at him and either he's making me laugh hysterically because he's just doing something funny or I just get touched looking at him and I'm in tears.

[1225] It's like I just go back and forth between laughing and crying because he touches me so much.

[1226] That's amazing.

[1227] Yeah, it's hard to explain to people that don't have children.

[1228] It's a weird transformation that takes place in your mind and just this outpouring of love.

[1229] And then I'm just, you know, and he's in that 15 -month period where it's like as far as I'm concerned he could just stay this way for the next five years just not get any older just stay here that doesn't work that way but the idea that's like he doesn't know what he looks like and he doesn't care and when he smiles it's not a conscious decision on his part it's just because he saw something that makes him smile when he laughs there's no thought behind it it's just it's like he finds it funny it's pure when he cries it's the same thing he's trying to communicate something bugs him you know it's just he's just so unselfconscious and and I just like kind of adore that that's awesome so you're just going to be a dad yeah it's like oh well I'm also I'm a writer you know so it's like I'll write books I'll write both you know fiction books and I'll write cinema books so nonfiction books I'll write books about cinema I've written a play I'll probably intend to do the play after I finish the first two books and then we'll see how many more of those happen and then eventually I'll get around to doing I'm not in a hurry to do the 10th one but eventually it'll present itself to me Is your process different for writing a film than it is for writing a book in terms of like is it more involved?

[1230] Is it more satisfying?

[1231] Well, I've only written one book and it's based on a movie I did, so that was very specific.

[1232] Now, I wanted to do a novelization because I was always a big fan of novelizations.

[1233] They were like the first adult books I ever read when I was a kid in the 70s.

[1234] So I kind of dug them out and started reading them again.

[1235] Hey, these are fucking, the good ones are a blast.

[1236] Maybe I should do one of these for one of my movies.

[1237] And I wanted to write novels anyway, so that was a great way to start.

[1238] But usually when it comes to a movie, is like I come up with an idea that's an interesting idea I come up with a couple of characters that are interesting and it's usually deals with a genre that I'm fond of and then so I think about it and I think about it maybe it gets like it gets more clear in my mind then usually I go into because I have a record room in my house so it's like a little used record store with my vinyl collection then I go and I try to find music that could be right for the movie and if I do that, well, that goes a long way.

[1239] And then at some point, after thinking about it for a while, I sit down and write what would be the opening scene.

[1240] And if I catch fire during the opening scene, I go, okay, well, I guess this is the next movie I'm doing.

[1241] Wow.

[1242] That's a cool way to do it.

[1243] That's why my opening scenes always are impactful, because that's me talking myself into it.

[1244] That's me trying to get into it.

[1245] So how do you come up with, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

[1246] Because you're fucking with a historical timeline.

[1247] I mean, and it's very satisfying and very exciting.

[1248] Well, I worked on that piece for about eight years because I wasn't in any hurry of getting it done.

[1249] So I think I was actually either I was in, no, I wasn't in Austin.

[1250] I was in London doing promotion work on death proof when I think I wrote the first two things on once a upon a time in Hollywood, and it was actually written in book form then.

[1251] I wasn't trying to turn it into a movie.

[1252] And it was written in prose form, and then I kind of discovered who the characters were, and I liked the idea of using this Hollywood knowledge I had that I could pour it into a story.

[1253] And then so what I would do is, so it started writing, it became book form, then it became play for a little bit, and then it kind of metamorphosized into a script.

[1254] And then in between projects, it's what I would do to get myself back into writing again.

[1255] And just sort of like syphilis, just kind of, not syphilis, the guy who pushed the rock up the hill.

[1256] Sisyphus?

[1257] Sisyphus, yeah.

[1258] Yeah, just kind of pushed the rock up the hill a little further, a little further each time.

[1259] And then I'll abandon the rock and go start doing the next thing I was going to do.

[1260] And after hateful late, I figured that was going to be the same thing.

[1261] I'd push it up to a certain point and then stop, and then all of a sudden, oh, no, no, I'm not stopping.

[1262] It's all coming in.

[1263] I guess, I guess this is it.

[1264] I guess this is what I'm going to do it.

[1265] And so, yeah, so then I just kind of finished it.

[1266] But it was just this whole idea of making a movie that takes place in this time.

[1267] I had the two characters, Rick and Cliff, and just dealing in that world.

[1268] So you started out in book form and then shifted back and forth, play to screenwriting.

[1269] Right.

[1270] So that it makes a natural sort of a progression for you to come back and review it as a book.

[1271] Yeah, I mean, because and the way I, and because I was in no hurry, when I wanted to learn something about the character, I wrote through it.

[1272] So it's always easy to put like Marvin, the agent, Marvin and Rick together, and then they could talk out any issues about his career.

[1273] They could talk out any problems Rick had, just as a form of that dialogue.

[1274] Like, for instance, okay, in the book, it's not in the movie.

[1275] In the book, when Rick finishes his Lancer episode, James Stacey, the character of Timothy Oliphon played, as, hey, you know, Rick, after work, you want to go grab a drink?

[1276] Yeah, sure, let's do that.

[1277] And so they go to this bar in San Gabriel called the Drinkers Hall of Fame.

[1278] Now, that bar existed in 1969 because my dad was a piano bar musician, my stepdad.

[1279] He was a piano bar musician, and he used to play at that bar.

[1280] And so I wrote like a 20 -page scene of Rick and Cliff and James Stacey going to this bar and they meet another actor that was a friend of my dad's.

[1281] And my dad is even in the scene.

[1282] He's the piano bar musician.

[1283] They even bring me up.

[1284] Rick gets an autograph for me because I'm a fan of 14 -Fist of McCluskey.

[1285] and so it all plays out and it's like 20 pages and it explains a lot and it's really cool okay well I didn't even bother to type that up I mean that's not going to make the movie what in the third act a 20 minute scene where they go to a bar and shoot the shit for 20 minutes so that's not going to make the movie but it was but it was it was rewarding writing it it was fun writing it and I learned a lot about the characters from writing it so now when I'm writing a book it's just it's made to order Were you obsessed with the Manson family?

[1286] How much research did you do on what those folks did back then?

[1287] Well, I did a tremendous amount of research.

[1288] I read a bunch of different books on it.

[1289] I mean, actually, I didn't read chaos because it hadn't been published yet.

[1290] I didn't read chaos until I read it yet?

[1291] Yeah, I totally read it.

[1292] Isn't it fucking incredible?

[1293] No, I actually was even able to call up Tom O 'Neill has a couple mutual friends, so he sent me the book.

[1294] Oh, wow.

[1295] And I read it.

[1296] And so I was more informed by.

[1297] by that when I was writing the book.

[1298] But I even actually was able to call Tom and talk to him about the book a little bit because I'd come up with some theories on my own so I was testing some of my theories out on him and I was even able to ask him a couple specific questions that could help me in the case of the book.

[1299] For people who don't know, Tom O 'Neill worked on that book for more than 20 years and it started off as an article that he was hired to write and then in researching the article he realized like there's a lot more to these killings than anybody could have ever possibly imagined, including the CIA doing mind control experiments on prisoners with LSD.

[1300] And it's, I mean, it's just...

[1301] It's amazing.

[1302] It's an amazing book.

[1303] It's an amazing piece of journalism.

[1304] How he managed to carry that through for 20 years is unfathomable.

[1305] Well, when he came on my podcast and talked to me about it.

[1306] That was a great show.

[1307] That was a great show.

[1308] Thank you.

[1309] He's so good.

[1310] And the weight of this being lifted off of him, having actually given birth to this book after 20 years of it being his life, it was so like he could feel it in him.

[1311] It's like, wow, like I can't believe it's even done.

[1312] And it's so fucking good and so thorough.

[1313] And it really makes you question so many of the things that happened during the 1960s.

[1314] You question everything.

[1315] But also it's just, it's the takedown of Bugliosi, which was the number one thing that jumped out at me when I just started.

[1316] started the research is when I read Elton, I go, this doesn't make sense.

[1317] This is all just about his case.

[1318] Yes.

[1319] This is about him building a case.

[1320] Because he doesn't have a case.

[1321] Right.

[1322] And then, you know, and then Charlie and the girls act so fucking crazy that they prop up this ridiculous.

[1323] Yeah.

[1324] You know, pseudo story.

[1325] But the fact that Charlie kept getting out of jail.

[1326] Oh, that's amazing.

[1327] The whole thing.

[1328] And again, the other books talk about that.

[1329] How can that be?

[1330] How can that be?

[1331] And then O 'Neill kind of explains you how it could be.

[1332] Yeah.

[1333] Well, not only that, but he establishes that there was a real, there was real operations, like Operation Midnight Climals.

[1334] Oh, no, absolutely.

[1335] But you realize, no, no, this isn't just bad luck or good luck on Charlie's point.

[1336] But the other books just kind of keep chalking it up to that.

[1337] Yeah.

[1338] Well, I think it took someone doing a 10 -year deep dive on the Manson Family Killings to really find out what the truth.

[1339] his story was yeah i mean look i come from a place that i don't know this and even and for everything i can say that backs up my theory i can also point out a couple things that kick my theory in the shins to some degree or another so working from the idea that everything bucliosi suggests it happened is bullshit okay so just working from that thing i think it's entirely possible I believe, and it's just a belief.

[1340] I don't believe Charlie sent texts and the girls to CLO Drive to murder everybody.

[1341] I don't think he sent them there to do that.

[1342] He actually did, you know, after they did what they did, yes, they did go out the next night and kill the La Biancas.

[1343] And he orchestrated that.

[1344] He was the stage manager of that.

[1345] I think it's possible that it is like Charlie said, that he just sent them out to do something freaky, do a creepy crawl, and it got carried out of hand.

[1346] Because supposedly, the girls didn't know what they were supposed to do until after they had already climbed the fence and were on the property.

[1347] They all thought it was a creepy crawl.

[1348] If he meant to send them out there, it doesn't make any motherfucking sense.

[1349] that he wouldn't mention it he wouldn't talk that he would only talk to text he didn't let them take a shit you know without a 20 -minute pep talk about what they were doing and what's going on but also it doesn't make any sense if that was the plan to bring linda casabian with them she didn't even have a nickname she was just you know she wasn't indoctrinated she was just brand new to the place now in the bugliosi book well then one What the fuck is she doing there?

[1350] And then the answer is, you know, and the answer, well, she's the only one that had a driver's license.

[1351] But they didn't let her drive.

[1352] She didn't drive to there and she didn't drive away.

[1353] Tex was driving.

[1354] I mean, if the plan is to go and kill everybody in the Cello Drive house, why isn't Squeaky sitting in that seat?

[1355] Instead of Linda Gassabian?

[1356] Why isn't a Clem sitting in that seat?

[1357] Why isn't Sandra Good sitting in that seat?

[1358] Why isn't Ruth Ann Morehouse?

[1359] sitting in that seat.

[1360] It doesn't make any sense if the plan was to murder everybody to send somebody who is not fully adopted, you know, into the cult where, like, where you had everybody else who absolutely were.

[1361] Now, I'm not saying, yes, he killed Shorty Shea and he, you know, he was responsible for the Gary Hinman murder.

[1362] I'm not saying he hadn't committed murder.

[1363] I just don't think he set them there to commit murder that night.

[1364] I think that was pretty much Texas fucking idea.

[1365] And I also think that it wasn't even his 100 % idea until it all kind of happened.

[1366] I think possibly they went over the fence.

[1367] And when Gary Parent, the guy who was visiting the guy in the back house came driving up, I think it's possible that he startled them.

[1368] And it was an impulse killing when they shot the guy in the car.

[1369] and then after that they were committed so when you're sitting on this story and you you're doing research on this you're reading all these books on the Manson family and you're putting together the idea first for the pros and then for eventually this film this has got to be like it's got at first it's a wild choice to change the timeline and so what was that about well it was just it sounded like I had already done something like that with In Glorious Basters, and I enjoyed it, and people, other people seem to enjoy it.

[1370] Yeah.

[1371] And so it's like, that's mine.

[1372] I can do that.

[1373] You can't do that.

[1374] I can do it.

[1375] You're ripping me off if you do it.

[1376] I'm not ripping myself.

[1377] It's my thing.

[1378] Has no one else ever done that before?

[1379] A long time ago and everything.

[1380] And I think books, books, there'll be like a lot of World War II speculative fiction that happens and stuff.

[1381] But so I decided to do it.

[1382] And, like, you know, you ask me, have I've always been fascinated with the, obsessed with the Manson family?

[1383] No, I was never necessarily obsessed with the Manson family.

[1384] But if you grow up in Los Angeles, you grow up with it as part of your culture.

[1385] Right.

[1386] It's part of their.

[1387] And in particular, like, the Gen X kids always had a thing about the Manson family and, like, a real true fascination.

[1388] Because you were real young when it was going down.

[1389] Yeah, exactly.

[1390] Yeah, we were all just, like, young enough to, like, you know.

[1391] heard the name Manson when we were like four or six or something on the news and then like you learn about it and then like you know we remember the time when helter -skelter played on television and everybody had that fucking book yeah everyone knows what the fucking book looks like and um you know and so the you know so the idea is you know with cliff we make him like one of the most dangerous dudes who ever fucking lived and then whoa on And that night they go to Cliff and they deal with him.

[1392] And, well, okay, I guess it goes a little differently.

[1393] Now you're not dealing with Sharon and Jay.

[1394] Right.

[1395] I got to crack up because, you know, I'm friendly with Dan Aykroyd and his wife, Donna.

[1396] And so I kind of tell him about the movie.

[1397] And then the movie comes out and they go see it.

[1398] And Dan leaves a little message on my answering machine.

[1399] He goes, hey, Quentin, how you doing?

[1400] Just letting you know me and Donna, we went and saw the film.

[1401] And it was terrific.

[1402] No need to call us back.

[1403] Just letting you know, we saw it and had a good time.

[1404] Oh, boy.

[1405] Those hippies sure picked the wrong fucking house that night, huh?

[1406] Well, there was a lot.

[1407] Dan Aykroyd, first of all, is a strange character.

[1408] Very interesting guy.

[1409] I love talking to him.

[1410] But he's obsessed with UFOs.

[1411] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[1412] I think his dad is, too, actually.

[1413] It's a family thing.

[1414] And vodka.

[1415] Yes.

[1416] The skull vodka.

[1417] Yeah, he gave me a case of it.

[1418] But the UFO thing with him is like, it's wild, man. He's like a full -on true believer.

[1419] It's a weird conversation when you have with them.

[1420] Because, like, you know, you think of the guy from Ghostbusters.

[1421] You never think you're going to be sitting across from talking to him about UFOs.

[1422] Well, I mean, but that's actually one of the things in Ghostbusters is one of the things I always liked about it is the Dan Akron character has played very, very straight.

[1423] Every time, like, you know, he's always coming up with this really interesting.

[1424] fact about paranormal this or paranormal that.

[1425] And it's like, it's never played for laughs.

[1426] Right.

[1427] His, like, you know, his connection to the paranormal is actually always played very, very straight.

[1428] I guess he's probably always had that thing.

[1429] Another thing in once upon a time in Hollywood that got controversial was the Bruce Lee scenes.

[1430] Yeah, yeah.

[1431] Yeah, a lot of people felt like you made Bruce Lee into an asshole.

[1432] Yeah, well, okay, that's, okay.

[1433] I'm a little hesitant to talk about this because I don't want like this to the only thing, all right, the people pull from this show.

[1434] But I figured you were going to bring it up especially, because I've heard you guys go back and forth on it a little bit.

[1435] I mean, where I'm coming from is I can understand his daughter having a problem with it.

[1436] It's her fucking father, all right?

[1437] I get that.

[1438] But anybody else, go, suck a dick.

[1439] You know, and the thing about it, though, is, like, you know, even if you just look at it, it's obvious Cliff tricked him.

[1440] That's how he was able to do it.

[1441] He tricked him.

[1442] You know, it's like, it's explained more in the book, but the thing is, like, they do a three fall, a two falls out of three contest.

[1443] So Cliff loves shit like that, you know.

[1444] And he has a method.

[1445] And his method is to give the guy the first fall.

[1446] Okay.

[1447] Do your fucking move, dude.

[1448] Right.

[1449] Let me see your move.

[1450] All right.

[1451] he gives him no resistance whatsoever, the guy does the move.

[1452] He knocks him on his ass.

[1453] And there's like four different ways Bruce could have come at him the second time that Cliff wouldn't would have had very little defense against.

[1454] But most of the time, if a guy has a particular move and it looks like the guy's a lung head, just a big mouth, who can't really defend himself, they do the second move again.

[1455] I mean, they do the first move again.

[1456] second time.

[1457] Well, now Cliff knows what it is.

[1458] So he prepares for it.

[1459] He pivots.

[1460] He catches him.

[1461] He throws his ass into the car.

[1462] Right.

[1463] You know, and now the third time will be the charming and gets broken up.

[1464] But he just tricked him.

[1465] And Bruce realized he got tricked.

[1466] If Cliff hadn't been so vicious, he could have even appreciated it.

[1467] Do you know about the history of Bruce and Jean -Lebel?

[1468] Yeah, of course.

[1469] Did you research that before?

[1470] Yeah, well, I've always known it and everything.

[1471] And like, well, the stuntman hated Bruce.

[1472] Really?

[1473] On Green Hornet.

[1474] No, it's in the, it's in Matthew, Paul.

[1475] Molly's book.

[1476] And before that, it's always been known.

[1477] That's why Gene LaBelle was brought on to teach Bruce respect for American stuntman.

[1478] Bruce had nothing but disrespect for stuntmen.

[1479] And he was always hitting them.

[1480] He was always hitting them with his feet.

[1481] He was always tagging.

[1482] It's called tagging.

[1483] When you hit a stuntman for real.

[1484] And he was always tagging him with his feet.

[1485] And he was always tagging him with his fist.

[1486] And they got to be the point we're like, no, I refuse to work with him.

[1487] Really?

[1488] And he had nothing but disrespect for American stuntman.

[1489] Huh.

[1490] That's interesting.

[1491] I wonder what that was about.

[1492] I wonder what his perspective would have been if somebody asked him to explain it.

[1493] It's like, oh, they're just not good enough.

[1494] They're their pussies.

[1495] I want to make it look real.

[1496] Okay.

[1497] So he was hitting him to make it look real.

[1498] Yeah.

[1499] But they don't like that.

[1500] No. That's unprofessional.

[1501] Well, that is unprofessional, but that's been done before in a bunch of movies by people that say are assholes.

[1502] Yeah.

[1503] And, well, and, you know, And actually, somebody else who had a reputation pretty similar to Bruce Lee's in that regards was like Robert Conrad during that time, yeah.

[1504] And, you know, he did a lot of his own stunts, and he did some really, really gnarly shit.

[1505] But if you, and I've always been a big fan of Robert Conrad.

[1506] But, you know, in the stunt community, he was known as Robert never met a stunt man he couldn't blame Conrad.

[1507] The stunt world is a fucking crazy world because they're the people that occasionally die making movies.

[1508] Yeah, absolutely.

[1509] Which is just nuts.

[1510] And look, the thing about it is also, Cliff is a hand -to -hand combat killer.

[1511] He, you know, he fought in World War II.

[1512] He fought with the Filipino resistant fighters, you know, in the Philippines against the Japanese.

[1513] If Cliff fought Bruce Lee at one of Aaron Banks' Madison Square Garden tournaments, Cliff wouldn't stand a chance against Bruce Lee at a Madden Square Garden martial arts tournament.

[1514] but as a killer who has killed men before in a jungle he'd kill Bruce Lee he'd fucking kill him Bruce Lee's not a killer Bruce Lee's never really let loose on anybody he's always had to keep it together in a martial arts tournament kind of kind of way if he's actually facing a guy who could actually kill him it's a different story you know it's in the book Bruce Lee realizes When Cliff takes a hand -to -hand A military hand -to -hand combat stance He realized, oh shit, this guy's a killer This guy's not fighting me He's fighting his instinct to kill me How much did you research martial arts When you're watching that?

[1515] How much knowledge do you have about martial arts?

[1516] Quite a bit At least as far as like the practitioners of it And everything, yeah But as far as like How fights go down?

[1517] and like different styles and oh yeah well no well no well pretty much i mean you know because at a certain point you know i was choreographing the fights and kill bill oh yeah yeah and it was like the stunt team that was executing them well you have this deep love for those hong kong films right exactly yeah look and look in in real life like the the phoniest thing that in movies is a kung fu film yeah because in real life no somebody's going to fuck up and the fight's going to be over in 30 seconds right you said you can't do that it's like somebody's going to make a mistake and then that's when like you know bam your jaw is broken on the fucking ground or your or your wrist is broken or something um but like yeah no brusely's not going to win not not going to win a kill or be killed fight with a fucking green beret who has killed guys 30 pounds heavier than them in fucking war well Well, in the real world, Bruce Lee was quite a bit smaller than most people, too.

[1518] I think he was only, like, 140 pounds or something like that.

[1519] And, you know, and, you know, he never learned how to take a punch, you know.

[1520] And he'll say, well, you can punch me. Yeah, okay, well, you know, okay, you know.

[1521] Let me see you be Jerry Quarry, fight Ali for four rounds with a busted jaw.

[1522] Well, he's a tiny guy.

[1523] There's no way that was ever going to happen.

[1524] Well, there, exactly.

[1525] But people talk about it like he's fucking Jesus.

[1526] Yeah, people do.

[1527] He's, well, in the martial arts world, there was this dogmatic approach that was, you, you, you, it was almost like religion.

[1528] You had to believe wholeheartedly in your style.

[1529] If you're a kung fu guy that you believe in Wing Chung, that was your thing.

[1530] If you believed in karate, that was your thing.

[1531] Judo, whatever it was.

[1532] You were fully committed and you only train in that style.

[1533] He was the first guy, and he did this in the 1960s and the 70s that decided to combine all the these arts together and put it together as G kundo and no one not only had no one done that but it was like highly frowned upon and look and the thing is I'm not putting him down I'm actually a big Bruce Lee fan I think and the dragon's a piece of shit but but but but but fist of fury is fucking great that's one of the greatest action movies ever made when he goes and fights the japanese in the dojo and that's one of the great action scenes of all time and and and he is a magnificent an athlete.

[1534] There's no two questions.

[1535] He may be, you know, the greatest martial art practitioner as an athlete, as somebody who, like, went on a career, you know, to promote it.

[1536] And it bugged him that he couldn't fight the way boxers fight.

[1537] That they always had to do patty cake.

[1538] They always had to hold their blows.

[1539] You know, he always looked at it as like, no, they see, that's true combat.

[1540] I want to do combat and they won't let me do combat.

[1541] But boxers do combat.

[1542] But I was like, you know, talking with Matthew Polly, who wrote the biography on Bruce Lee.

[1543] And he goes, well, you know, like, you got to know that like the number one question Bruce Lee was asked all the time is, well, what would happen if you and Muhammad Ali fought?

[1544] And he had different answers.

[1545] Sometimes you know, John Saxon would ask him on Air of the Dragon.

[1546] And go, are you kidding that guy's hands or as big as my head.

[1547] But then other times, he had other answers.

[1548] And it's like, you know, Bruce didn't think anybody could beat him in a fight at the end of the day.

[1549] And he watched Ollie's tape.

[1550] He watched 16mm films of Ollie fighting.

[1551] And it's one of those things right.

[1552] Ah, he drops his left.

[1553] Okay, well, okay, well, the trick is I got to be able to fight him without gloves.

[1554] And I got to have kicking privileges.

[1555] Okay, that would be the trick.

[1556] Well, you know, Ali did, he had that one fight with Inoki.

[1557] Did you ever see that?

[1558] I've heard of it, yeah.

[1559] It's pretty wild.

[1560] He had a boxing match where Anoki, it was a fight.

[1561] Anoki was allowed to kick him.

[1562] But he did it off of his back.

[1563] So Anoki literally dropped to his back and was kicking Ali's legs.

[1564] Oh, yeah, like when that big wrestler guy fought Ali and he spent the entire time on the back, on his back.

[1565] Well, that was him.

[1566] Oh, that's that same guy.

[1567] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1568] That's him.

[1569] Yeah, so it's like, you know, Ali had done some weird stuff, too.

[1570] And that was when Ali was the champ.

[1571] So it's a bizarre choice.

[1572] That was a crazy, yeah.

[1573] Yeah, but, yeah.

[1574] Did it bother you the controversy, the Bruce Lee thing?

[1575] Did it feel like?

[1576] Yeah, well, like I said, I understood where his family was coming from.

[1577] I didn't understand where anybody else was coming from.

[1578] They could pound sand.

[1579] Well, you have to have that attitude to make the kind of films you do.

[1580] Yeah, right.

[1581] So.

[1582] I mean, like, also, I was going to say, it's like a, I'll come back to me later.

[1583] Is that the biggest controversy in that regard in terms of content of any of the movies you've ever made?

[1584] Oh, God, no. What's the biggest?

[1585] Well, like, the violence, the violence was, like, considered a big deal.

[1586] all right when reservoir dogs came out uh the torture scene yeah the torture scene and then like you know um and then with hateful aid there was all this like there was this thing about violence against women because of what happens you know to Jennifer Jason Lee right and which I think is just bullshit because um if it was because there's nothing that happens to her that couldn't have happened to a man in that same situation I would just use an analogy okay well Instead of Daisy Domergoo, it's Big Bell Shelly, a guy 250 pounds with a big old fucking Grizzly Adams beard or something like that.

[1587] You wouldn't think shit about Kurt Russell smacking him all the time, man. You wouldn't think shit about hanging him.

[1588] You wouldn't think about shit about any of that stuff happening to him.

[1589] Okay, well, I'm having it happen to a girl who's just as bad as Big Bill Shelley.

[1590] Right.

[1591] Because I'm not playing fucking favorites.

[1592] Yeah, there's a thing that you, that's what I was talking about, about you being grandfathered in.

[1593] in many ways.

[1594] It's like you're willing to do that even though you know that a lot of people are going to have an issue with a woman, even if it's a bad woman.

[1595] Well, it makes it, yeah, I know.

[1596] Look, and the thing is, it does make it a little harder to watch, but I'm down with it being harder to watch.

[1597] Good.

[1598] It's a fucking rough movie.

[1599] Yeah.

[1600] It's supposed to hurt.

[1601] It's supposed to hurt.

[1602] You know, when it's like a kind of a black family vaguely that runs the the stage coach relays plays and then Daisy's gang murders them all well having them black makes it hurt more well good it's supposed to hurt this attitude towards making films like is this there's not a lot of people that share this attitude you know it's hard is it hard what is it about this like doing a film where you're it's such a unique vision like it's so clearly the vision of one man and a wild man at that that's willing to make these kind of films.

[1603] But this is not common.

[1604] There's not a lot of people that make movies the way you do.

[1605] It's a very, very tiny percentage.

[1606] Yeah, but that's why I like the people that I like.

[1607] I mean, you know, Brian De Palma was criticized for misogyny.

[1608] And, you know, throughout his entire career, he told them all the fuck off.

[1609] You know, he was like, no, I'm making scary movies.

[1610] And, you know, you put Nancy Allen in that situation.

[1611] and it's going to be scarier than if I put Roy Scheider in that situation because I'm more word for Nancy Allen Jesus Christ, Roy Shider killed Jaws he's going to be scared of a black glove killer no, probably not and it was just like no this is a convention of the genre and I'm using this genre for my purposes or you know Sam Peckompop does the movies he wants to make and if you don't like it don't go see it and search Giuliani or any of these guys.

[1612] I'm freaking doing cruising.

[1613] You know, I get fuck off.

[1614] Well, I love the attitude, but it just seems insanely difficult if you're a person that is dealing with this whole committee of human beings.

[1615] You have executives and producers and you have all these different folks that are exerting their influence on something, but you've managed to get your vision in a very, in many ways, pure.

[1616] Yeah.

[1617] No, look, look, look, I'm.

[1618] I'm lucky.

[1619] There's no doubt about it.

[1620] I've had a wonderful situation.

[1621] I've had a wonderful ride.

[1622] I've been able to make movies ever since I did the first one.

[1623] Reservoir Dog, that set me up.

[1624] I had luck with my second one that it was really successful, so I was able to really, really make them.

[1625] And I was, you know, I never wrote a script that I couldn't get going.

[1626] It's like every next one was, okay, wherever.

[1627] I happened to be at that given time was going to be the next movie I did.

[1628] And I, you know, I might argue about this or that and the other, but I was allowed to make the movies the way I wanted to make them.

[1629] And it's been all the way to now.

[1630] And I never have to answer to a committee, you know, like in the case of once upon a time in Hollywood.

[1631] It's like, no, I was, you know, I was answering to, he was financing it.

[1632] I was answering to Tom Rothman, the head of Columbia Pictures.

[1633] and so it wasn't a committee it was him so we had an issue we talked about it and whatever but I want to be a good partner so I'm listening to him but I'm not going to you know stab my moving the balls was there some stuff in that movie that he thought was not not appropriate or not too dangerous more like he would wins at stuff he goes uh Quinn they're going to go after you for this well that's okay I can I can handle it I'm trying to help you man But it's not helping you, right?

[1634] Ultimately.

[1635] I know what he means.

[1636] I know what he means.

[1637] And would I rather not have to deal with controversy or the first week the movie comes out?

[1638] And so that's what everybody's talking about as opposed to the movie.

[1639] No, that would be it, that would be, you know, that would be counterproductive.

[1640] I don't care if they talk about it later.

[1641] Just maybe not the first fucking week.

[1642] But your films, they have to have controversy.

[1643] There's just no way.

[1644] It's just.

[1645] Well, then like, well, no one's going to agree on everything you do.

[1646] Well, also you, you know.

[1647] But there's also this.

[1648] There's also like, okay, there's real controversy.

[1649] And then there's like, okay, this guy or this woman is going to write a think piece in the New Yorker about my movie or in the Los Angeles Times or in the New York Times.

[1650] And they're going to write some think piece about it or on this website or that website.

[1651] And they're going to go against it and talk about, oh, this is a retrograde vision.

[1652] know that this is a regressive vision or you know quitting has become right wing and this has a this movie has a right wing bent because of the way they you know quitting is identifying with Rick Dalton with the fucking hippies you know that's how it's that's how is that really a take that someone had that you've become right wing yeah that character yeah yeah even like a critic who liked it a oh Scott goes well it just this seems a little this seems this whole vision seems more on the right than you would imagine for the quit in Tarantino.

[1653] I mean, it doesn't necessarily make it wrong, make it bad, but it just seems like more on the right.

[1654] Well, Rick is coming from a place more on the right, not me, per se, but I am telling the story through Rick's point of view.

[1655] And they say something, well, how come they don't talk about, you know, how come there aren't more black characters in the movie?

[1656] How come they don't talk about the Vietnam more and more?

[1657] Well, basically, the movie takes place between two days.

[1658] Well, they didn't bump into any, they didn't bump into Jim Brown, right, on those two days.

[1659] All right?

[1660] You know, they, they saw who they fucking saw during those two days.

[1661] Well, they didn't have a conversation about Vietnam in those two days.

[1662] I can't just deal with all the hot button issues if I'm set up in a thing between two days.

[1663] Oh, Margaret Robbie doesn't talk enough.

[1664] She spends the entire movie by her fucking self.

[1665] I could have given her, if you were just counting lines, I could have put Mr. Saperstein in the car, you know, with her dog.

[1666] And she could have just been having a running commentary with her dog about picking up Romans dry cleaning and getting the book and maybe I'll go see the movie.

[1667] And, well, that would have actually taken care of, that would have taken care of the line count, but it would have been bullshit.

[1668] Right.

[1669] It doesn't seem like part of the problem is just that it came out during the time where Trump was president.

[1670] And like, that's one of the reasons why these political takes on things, like that he's more to the right.

[1671] I just, I can't imagine that anybody would think that you are, your, you're, your, leaning right now that Quentin is becoming right because your character is that seems so stupid stupid but it's more of a like it's just a statement about the politicalization of everything.

[1672] Well, I think you're right.

[1673] I think you're correct.

[1674] And the thing about it though is, look, those kind of like academic college think pieces, they're just fine.

[1675] Like in a college situation, they make sense.

[1676] I can take a book or a movie.

[1677] and come up with some argument that goes, you know, that's like a, that's more of a subtextual argument about a film.

[1678] That doesn't mean I'm right, but it means I can make my little argument, you know, for the course.

[1679] But it doesn't, but I have no illusions that that's what the director was thinking about.

[1680] And now, ultimately, when it comes to subtextual criticism, it doesn't matter.

[1681] It's simply you making your little case.

[1682] But in the heat of the moment, they're actually treated more seriously than that.

[1683] how do you parse out when you when you have experienced criticism about a film do you do you go over that criticism to you read it or do you just get to a point where you're like you know what i know what i did i love what i did i don't give a fuck well i i like to write film criticism so i can like so i can take it with a grain of salt one if i either know who if i know who they are all right then i have a sense of where they're coming from and what where they're talking about But within three paragraphs, I see where this guy or woman is coming from, and they either like my stuff or they don't like it.

[1684] And if they're inclined to like my stuff and they go negative on it, that's interesting to see what it is that did that.

[1685] I mean, a lot of the critics that like me didn't like hateful aid.

[1686] And it all came down to the fact that it was just too rough a vision for them.

[1687] It was just too cynical.

[1688] It was too cruel.

[1689] that's one of my favorite movies because I mean I feel like wow that's that's the Sam Peckinpaw movie I always wanted to make it's a fucking cruel pitiless vision it's well but it's called the hateful eight it's the idea is there's no good guys in the movie yeah they're all fuckers yeah and well that's except for the stagecoach driver he's like he's not that's why he's nine he's he's not part of the hateful eight but it's one of your best movies and it's it's it's a great example of a Tarantino movie in that there is no bad there is no good.

[1690] Yeah.

[1691] It's all bad guys.

[1692] And it's just, it's still incredibly enjoyable.

[1693] That's how I think, yeah.

[1694] And chaos.

[1695] And so when like, you know, so I actually kind of took it as a badge of honor that like the people who like my movies, they didn't say they didn't like this, but it was just like, it was just too rough for them.

[1696] Yeah.

[1697] And it was like, I think A .O. Scott, who's always been a pretty good champion of mine, you know, he says something in the fact that, well, Tarantina's playing with racism.

[1698] And it's playing with racism and misogyny and gruesomeness.

[1699] And there's really no way you can do that and keep your hands clean.

[1700] That's a good way to put it.

[1701] It's a good way to put it.

[1702] And I was like, who wants clean hands?

[1703] Yeah.

[1704] I make hateful hate to get them dirty.

[1705] Right.

[1706] You're in the wild movie business.

[1707] Yeah.

[1708] Yeah, there's no clean hands in the wild movie business.

[1709] Yeah.

[1710] Well said.

[1711] When you think that you have this one more film to make, is there more weight on that?

[1712] Or you just do your fucking thing?

[1713] The weight was really on once upon a time in Hollywood.

[1714] That's kind of like my big epic.

[1715] That's like my big wrap -up the career kind of epic.

[1716] And I think I did it.

[1717] So I don't know what the next story is going to be.

[1718] I'm imagining it'll be more epilogy.

[1719] Like this is the big one.

[1720] and then whatever I ended up doing for that last one.

[1721] Like I said, more of an epilogue just as you're wrapping up the career.

[1722] But you don't have a specific idea.

[1723] I have no idea.

[1724] Do you have a timeline?

[1725] No. No, I want to, I hope to do two more books.

[1726] Well, I mean, one more book, and then do a play, and then we'll see where we are.

[1727] Let's see if another story has come.

[1728] I mean, the only one I can imagine where it would be another epic, where I need to outdo everything as if I did a Kill Bill 3.

[1729] Have you thought of that?

[1730] I thought of it, yeah.

[1731] I heard something about a redo of Reservoir dogs.

[1732] Is that bullshit?

[1733] Well, I considered it.

[1734] Yeah?

[1735] I considered, I thought it would be something interesting about taking my first script and then just remaking it with different actors and just seeing how better a director I've come because I actually think the material is timeless enough.

[1736] I could do that.

[1737] But I think that's not really how I want to end the career.

[1738] But I could very well write a stage version of Reservoir Dogs when I'm doing theater and then just do it on stage.

[1739] I've planned on doing – I've got a first play that I've just wrote – that I wrote actually after I – before I started doing the movie once upon time in Hollywood, I wrote the script.

[1740] Then I didn't let anybody know I'd finish it, and then I wrote a play.

[1741] And then I wrote five episodes of Bounty Law.

[1742] And then I let the script out.

[1743] But I want to do A Hateful Eight later on stage and I want to do Reservoir Dogs later on stage.

[1744] Wow.

[1745] Hateful Eightful Eighth is a play would be pretty fucking wild.

[1746] Kill Bill Part 3.

[1747] You need some water?

[1748] Yeah, I do, actually.

[1749] But I could see myself also doing, I don't know if I would do, I doubt I'll do novelizations for everything I've written.

[1750] But I could see myself writing a novelization for Reservoir Dogs.

[1751] That would be cool.

[1752] Yeah, it would play well.

[1753] Yeah, like in the bookstore, it's already got its section ready to go into the mystery crime section and go right there under the keys.

[1754] Now, with Kill Bill 3, I mean, you already have these two epic films.

[1755] Is there like something that you felt was unresolved in the first two, or would you like to revisit the characters?

[1756] Well, I think it's just, I think it's just reversing the characters 20 years later, just imagining.

[1757] The bride and her daughter, Bibi, having 20 years of peace.

[1758] And, like, then that piece is shattered.

[1759] And now, like, the bride and her daughter, bride and Bibi are on the run.

[1760] And, you know, just the idea of being able to cast UMA and cast her daughter, Maya.

[1761] And the thing would be fucking exciting.

[1762] Yeah.

[1763] No. You know, and L. Driver's still out there.

[1764] Sophie Fetal got her arms cut off.

[1765] She's still out there.

[1766] Right, right, right.

[1767] They all got Bill's money.

[1768] Yeah.

[1769] actually a go -go had a twin sister shiaki all right uh uh and so like her twin sister could show up what was david caradine like he was great he was a great fan i grew up on that show yeah me too it was wild to him and him in that movie i was like wow what a what a great choice but perfect tarentino choice to have uh well you know how i ended up casting him was because i read his autobiography around the same time that i was like doing you know wrapping up the writing of kill bill and he wrote a biography called endless highway and it's one of the best actor biographies i ever read he was a really really terrific writer the way he wrote it was a little bit like mark twain it was a little bit like Charles Dickens and a little bit like Jack Carrowack, but also a lot like David Carity.

[1770] And he had this kind of Charles Dickens like life, like from the time he was a little boy.

[1771] So he's just kind of telling these stories.

[1772] And I mean, they're just absolutely fascinating.

[1773] What a life.

[1774] And then as I'm reading, I go, wow, he could be Bill, you know, and not just because of his lineage is Quichengen.

[1775] but like he could be a real interesting bill and just even the fact that he's sort of like this you know eastern cowboy you know he has this eastern mysticism aspect about him but he also has just full on western cowboy shit about him too well that sounds like bill yeah you know that tv show was supposed to be bruce lee too right no it wasn't it wasn't is that bullshit yeah it's complete lie really yeah i mean it's like um linda lee just as completely lied about that in that book she wrote, Bruce Lee, the man only I knew, the man only she knew.

[1776] Well, Betty Ta Ping, the mistress, who his bed, he died and probably knew him a little bit too.

[1777] I mean, Bruce Lee died in his mistress's bed.

[1778] Yeah, what did he die from?

[1779] It was like complications from a medication?

[1780] Something, yeah.

[1781] Yeah.

[1782] But she wrote this book called Bruce Lee, the Man Only I knew, which was actually the first biography I ever read.

[1783] And in the book, she claims that Bruce had written this idea for a TV show called The Warrior and that Warner Brothers read The Warrior and ripped it off.

[1784] And then they wrote Kung Fu.

[1785] And then they read Bruce Lee but decided not to use them because they're racist.

[1786] and then, boom, they cast David Carity.

[1787] Okay, kung fu was written by a guy name, I believe his name is David Abramson.

[1788] Abrams or Abramson.

[1789] Ed Abramson.

[1790] I might be pronouncing it wrong, but it's the name like that.

[1791] Okay, well, this is pretty fucking clear.

[1792] Ed Abramson either ripped off Bruce Lee's treatment for the warrior or he didn't.

[1793] Ed Abramson, either who was an established TV writer, he also wrote the movie Gordon's War that Ossie Davis directed.

[1794] He either created Quicheng Kane or Bruce Lee did.

[1795] He's either guilty of plagiarism or he's not.

[1796] Well, he's not.

[1797] He created, he never saw this warrior thing.

[1798] He created, and he has the, I talked to the author of the book about Bruce.

[1799] Matthew Pauley, you know, he said, oh, man, when I called Ed Abrams up, oh, my God.

[1800] It was the phone call he'd been waiting 40 years for because he's had to put up with this all this time.

[1801] He had all the information.

[1802] He had all the documentation of how he wrote the script and how he came up with Kwai Chang Kain.

[1803] You know, he wrote that script.

[1804] He created Kauai Chang Kain.

[1805] All right.

[1806] Now, okay, so let's also look at it from a different point of view.

[1807] Okay, so maybe Ed Abramson didn't rip off the warrior.

[1808] Okay, but maybe, say, Warner Brothers did.

[1809] Say Warner Brothers, hey, this is a great idea.

[1810] Okay, so this is written, so again, imagine Warner Brothers saying this.

[1811] Okay, so this is written by like the greatest martial artist guy of all time.

[1812] Let's get rid of him.

[1813] First thing, first thing, first thing, let's get rid of him.

[1814] We don't want him involved.

[1815] Why would we want him involved?

[1816] Let's get rid of him.

[1817] And now we'll just hire some guy, but we won't tell him that it's, based on this guy's treatment called The Warrior.

[1818] We won't tell him that.

[1819] Well, if they did that, and then the show becomes the phenomena, it becomes not just a hit, a phenomenon, like the biggest show of its era, like that and all in the family.

[1820] Well, I was the Lee family.

[1821] I'd be kind of mad at Warner Brothers, wouldn't you?

[1822] To rip me off so bad?

[1823] Yes.

[1824] Okay, well, naturally.

[1825] Okay, but when Bruce Lee is sitting in the catbird seat, and he does his first studio film, Enter the Dragon, who does you do it with?

[1826] Warner Brothers.

[1827] Right, but maybe they worked out some sort of a thing.

[1828] No, but they didn't.

[1829] Well, then, why isn't Linda Lee talking about that?

[1830] They didn't work out some money thing.

[1831] It's like, okay, not only that, her book is published by Warner Books.

[1832] Hmm.

[1833] But the reality is this, and it's in Matthew Polly's book.

[1834] Not only did Bruce Lee not write the world, before kung fu came about he wrote it afterwards he wrote it after he had read the kung fu script really yes and he read the kung fu script he tried out for it they didn't use them because they couldn't understand him when he talked they uh and it was it was actually between the three people it was between was bruce lee william smith who's william smith oh falconetti from rich man poor man oh okay you know the big muscle guy he was in all the biker movies movies of Conan's father in Conan, and they had Russian dude in Red Dawn.

[1835] Okay.

[1836] And David Carradine, because David Carradine had just done the play Royal Hunt of the Sun, and part of it was he played the head of the Incas, and he had this big crazy dance in it that was excited Broadway.

[1837] And David Carradine got it.

[1838] After he didn't get Kung Fu, that's when he wrote The Warrior.

[1839] And he took elements from Ed Abrams' Kung Fu script and put it in the warrior.

[1840] And Matthew Polly's book even says, well, you know, Bruce had a Hong Kong idea of plagiarism, which is everything is takeable as long as you can take it.

[1841] All right.

[1842] So, but anyway, that's not, okay, anyway, all that is what that is.

[1843] However, Linda Lee says in the book that, and it's been existed, This has been champion for years that Warner Brothers stole the idea from Bruce Lee's The Warrior.

[1844] And then they shit -hand him and they stole his idea that he's the one that came up with Kung Fu.

[1845] That's a complete lie.

[1846] Then they parroted it again in that dragon movie with Jason Lee.

[1847] It's said again.

[1848] And Abrams is all ready to sue them.

[1849] Okay, woman, I've got you now.

[1850] I've been putting up with this shit for 20 years, and then Brandon Lee died.

[1851] Wow.

[1852] And then he was like, okay, she just lost her son.

[1853] I'm not going to fucking do it.

[1854] All right.

[1855] But what would be really funny is Linda Lee is now producing that show Warrior based on Bruce Lee's original treatment.

[1856] What would be really funny is if Abrams who wrote Kung Fu and has had this this, lie put out about him forever if he sued them for plagiarism for the warrior wow this is that's a bombshell dude that's crazy it's all backed up it's all right there I believe you it's wild though it's a that's a wild take on on history because uh the history of film and then also the history of martial arts it's like Bruce Lee is such a pivotal yeah hey look I'm not putting Bruce Lee down in this I'm saying his wife is a liar I'm sorry saying is widow is a fucking liar.

[1857] She lied about that.

[1858] You know, it's either she's 100 % telling the truth or Ed Abrams is, and Ed Abrams is.

[1859] Is it possible that he lied to her and then she didn't know?

[1860] What do you mean?

[1861] That Bruce lied to her about the script?

[1862] I mean, it's possible that she's...

[1863] Well, okay, you can say she didn't know.

[1864] Well, she's the one writing a fucking book.

[1865] It's her job to know.

[1866] He might have told her something that's not accurate and she went with it.

[1867] I guess that's possible, but when you write it in a book, you take responsibility for it.

[1868] You check out.

[1869] Is your husband a loud mouth?

[1870] Does he say a bunch of shit that's not true?

[1871] Yeah.

[1872] Damn, this is heavy.

[1873] This is heavy shit for Bruce Lee fans.

[1874] Yikes.

[1875] Hey, Bruce Lee, as far as I know, Bruce Lee never said, Hey, I came up with Kung Fu.

[1876] It's Linda Lee's book who said it.

[1877] I see what you're saying.

[1878] Yeah.

[1879] It's a claim in Lindelie's book.

[1880] That TV show for martial arts and for people was just like when I was a kid, I mean it was a giant show.

[1881] I mean, everybody called everybody grasshopper when you're trying to make a profound point.

[1882] No, not only that.

[1883] It was like, you know, it happens every once in a while with TV shows where like when a TV show hits in the psych ice, like exactly the way.

[1884] Like lost.

[1885] It does.

[1886] It's like, like this, if it's built around a star, that star is not like a normal.

[1887] TV star.

[1888] He's like a rock star for a while.

[1889] David Carrading became a rock star in the early 70s because of that show.

[1890] The way like Don Johnson became like a rock star for that first season, first two seasons of Miami Vice.

[1891] Right.

[1892] Did you talk to him about that when you were doing Kill Bill?

[1893] Oh yeah.

[1894] We talked about it a lot.

[1895] That had to be a trip for him.

[1896] Well, one of the things that was so interesting about that show is they're always like teaching the little lessons when they go, like, you know, he sees something going on in the Old West, and then he remembers back to being at the Shaolin Temple where a similar lesson is taught.

[1897] And it's just kind of crazy for them to do this, like, TV show that deals with Buddhism and everything, and for them to get the Buddhism part so right.

[1898] I mean, those are the best parts of the show, were those little lessons, and they always were very profound, and they had a little poetry to them.

[1899] And I found out from David that, okay, we're not really using the Shaolin Temple theories.

[1900] It's pretty much Confucianism.

[1901] So we took anything that we thought worked.

[1902] We took stuff from American Indians.

[1903] We took stuff from this and that.

[1904] But basically what the philosophies that Kane is learning is Confucianism.

[1905] And you could have really done that in a very clunky manner.

[1906] And it really wasn't.

[1907] No, that's what I'm saying is like you would expect if ABC is going to do something like that is going to be.

[1908] clunky or it's going to be obvious or it's going to be like the most risable part of the fucking show as opposed to the most meaningful part yeah and it was also interesting he also said that um he goes um we never let outside writers write those scenes so if you were an out if you weren't part of the writing team if you wrote a script for kung fu they always tried to write those scenes but we only let the writers the people who are on the show write those scenes they would always take out if you were writing a spec script they would take out your your lesson and write their own that's interesting because they had they had a they were tuned into it yeah yeah they knew yeah they knew what they were doing the tone yeah yeah and they mean looking back on it now i mean even if you were a type of person was really cynical and called bullshit like they were good they were good lessons man yeah which is interesting for you know no i mean one i remember it's really interesting where it's like uh um it's like one with Andrew Prime where he's a gunfighter and he gets killed and the woman falls in love with him and and she's sitting there crying and and and Kane is consoling her and she says something about every time I've said it it kind of lays an egg but I thought that was profound in the show you know he Kane goes uh he's comforting her and she goes it's just such a waste it's just such a waste he goes well it's sad and it's loss I don't I don't know if it's a waste.

[1909] It's loss.

[1910] But in this loss, you're feeling pain.

[1911] And the pain is reminding you what it's like to be human.

[1912] And in that, there's gain.

[1913] Wow.

[1914] This is heavy for a time that was, it synced up with like the $6 million man. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1915] Think about what else was on TV at the time, right?

[1916] Or like the whole little, there's like the little moment when the young grasshopper is by a pool.

[1917] in the Chowlin temple and he's crying and Master Poe, the blind one Kee Luke, comes up to him and says, Oh, Grasshopper, what's with the tears?

[1918] What's the matter?

[1919] Well, because I'm all alone in the world.

[1920] That's what's a matter.

[1921] My parents are dead.

[1922] I'm all by myself in China.

[1923] You know, I'm all alone.

[1924] Okay.

[1925] Grasshopper, close your eyes.

[1926] What do you hear?

[1927] Listen, listen.

[1928] What do you really hear?

[1929] Well, I hear the fish swimming in the stream.

[1930] Okay, okay, what else do you hear?

[1931] Well, I hear the birds and the trees.

[1932] Okay, what else do you hear?

[1933] I hear the insects buzzing around.

[1934] Silly boy.

[1935] Crying of being all alone in such a crowded place.

[1936] It's kind of amazing that that show got made that way.

[1937] when you really think about it.

[1938] And there was a phenomenon.

[1939] Yeah, it really was.

[1940] Well, it was one of the things that got me really interested in martial arts other than Bruce Lee movies.

[1941] I bet.

[1942] And there wouldn't be any Bruce Lee movies without Kung Fu.

[1943] It was the idea that, like, it was because of Kung Fu that Warner Brothers bought Five Fingers of Death.

[1944] Really?

[1945] Yeah, and released it.

[1946] And that started the whole martial arts wave.

[1947] And like Five Fingers of Death was the first one, and then they came out with Big Boss, which they call Fist of Fury, and then Chinese Connection, which they called...

[1948] which was Fista Fior that they call Chinese Connection.

[1949] It's interesting, too, because Qua Chankan's take on violence was so reluctant.

[1950] Yeah, yeah.

[1951] And he was a completely different guy.

[1952] Like, he was this pacifist hero who didn't really want money.

[1953] He didn't want anything.

[1954] He was just kind of wandering around homeless through the world, and occasionally you'd have to fuck people up.

[1955] Yeah, yeah.

[1956] Yeah, right.

[1957] Like, you had to be on his side because he was never the guy that was, like, taking his shirt off and flexing his in abs.

[1958] No, he was no way.

[1959] I mean, no, I mean, I really think he was one of the.

[1960] the greatest characters in the history of television and i really think uh uh david caridine's performance in that was was just was amazing i mean there is a reason why he became a phenomenon i was because of david caridine's performance i mean just brusley was never the actor that david carotene was ever ever no he was amazing in that show and it's kind of fucked when you when you're a guy that's playing a character like quai chan you you you stay that character to people.

[1961] Yeah, yeah, uh -huh.

[1962] And it's very difficult for a guy like that to break out of that and then go off to do something that's completely...

[1963] But then he did it with Kill Bill.

[1964] I mean, there's a whole lot of...

[1965] It's so many years later.

[1966] But, I mean, like, now there's like three generations like, Quichane, who?

[1967] He's Bill.

[1968] Right, of course.

[1969] He's fucking Bill.

[1970] He's Bill.

[1971] Yeah, that is true.

[1972] It just took time for people to get past it.

[1973] But for so many, they're imprisoned by these massive roles.

[1974] Like, no matter what they do, they can't escape the gravity of what that first big breakout role was.

[1975] Even just to say what I was saying before, it's like, okay, so when, like, the show goes off the air and then about, like, 10 years later, they do a big TV movie, like the return of Kung Fu.

[1976] And then who's the co -star in it?

[1977] Literally, his sidekick is Brandon Lee.

[1978] Well.

[1979] Oh, yeah, that's right.

[1980] I forgot about that.

[1981] Naturally, oh, oh, you mean the TV show that they ripped off my dad's story and everyone became millionaires?

[1982] Oh, yeah, let me co -star on that.

[1983] no she's a liar wow shots fired ladies a gentleman I forgot about that second one the second season I completely forgot about it not that was it subpar not that no that was another bad movie not that kung fu the legend continues what was that that was a crappy show where all of a sudden now quicheng is in the 90s and it was like done in was that caridine too yeah it was carot that's what I'm thinking of yeah it was no but no they did a TV movie like in I don't know 80 or 81 or something like that and it's like still takes place in the old West and it's and it's quite Cheyenne King and he meets Brandon Lee's character no shit huh and the other thing I know Carradine from was he was in one of the Chuck Norris movies what was it lone wolf bequeh yeah when they have this the spaghetti western like cool fight that's a cool fight That's a cool fight.

[1984] That's a really cool fight.

[1985] Well, Chuck Norris had some underrated fun movies.

[1986] Yeah, yeah.

[1987] No, he did.

[1988] Yeah, it's some cool ones.

[1989] I'm a big Invasion USA fan.

[1990] Oh, no kidding.

[1991] Wow.

[1992] Invasion USA.

[1993] Well, I'm also a really big silent rage fan.

[1994] All right.

[1995] That's the one where it's like he's basically fighting Michael Myers from Halloween.

[1996] That's right.

[1997] That's a fucking terrific movie.

[1998] That's a terrific Chuck Norris movie.

[1999] No, he did some classics for sure.

[2000] When you look back at all this that you've done, And, you know, I mean, do you look back on it with satisfaction?

[2001] There's there anything you'd want to do differently?

[2002] No. I mean, not when it comes to the movies.

[2003] No, I mean, if I don't have satisfaction in my career, God, who would?

[2004] I mean, I've just had such a wonderful situation.

[2005] And like I said, you know, being able to play this game at this level, you know.

[2006] I mean, look, I started out in 91 or the 92 at the Sundance Film Festival.

[2007] It was a big year that year.

[2008] So it was like three quarters of the movies that played at Sundance all got released theatrically.

[2009] And the directors all kind of became known to some degree or another.

[2010] And it was like the beginning of the whole American independent New Wave thing.

[2011] And I thought that all of us would be making movies for the next 30 years.

[2012] and some of them did well and everything but now cut to 30 years later there's not many of them almost none of them except for Robert Rodriguez and maybe Rick Linklater they're making movies on the studio level and a lot of them haven't made movies in five or six years or longer or they're directing episodic television so you know just to be able to follow my muse wherever it went to be able to write whatever I wanted to do and be able to get it made and have actors who wanted to do it and have people who like it and want to back it and have people who want to go see it on opening weekend and just be able to go wherever it goes.

[2013] And also to be able to play at this level.

[2014] You know, we made once upon a time in Hollywood for $95 million.

[2015] I was able to shut down Hollywood Boulevard and recreate it back to 1969 without using CGI.

[2016] That was pretty amazing.

[2017] Yeah, the CGI thing, it really bugs you, right?

[2018] Yeah.

[2019] What about, did you enjoy Alita, Robert Rodriguez's film?

[2020] I have to say, I haven't seen it, because I wanted to see it in 3D, and I missed it in 3D.

[2021] So now I got to get over that and just...

[2022] I fucking loved it.

[2023] Yeah.

[2024] It's really good.

[2025] It's really good, and it's crazy how good the fucking CGI is now.

[2026] Yeah, well, also, that is what that is.

[2027] It has to be.

[2028] Yeah, exactly.

[2029] I mean, she's not even, you know, it's like a real person playing.

[2030] the role, but then they're painting this keen -eyed character.

[2031] Right.

[2032] Well, in this, I mean, I don't want to give any of it away, but there's parts of it where, you know, literally she's disembodied.

[2033] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2034] You have to.

[2035] Right.

[2036] It has to be CGI.

[2037] But do you, is there ever a possibility of a story that would appeal to you so much that would have to be done that way that you'd be interested?

[2038] And just at least thinking about it, engaging in it, entertaining it.

[2039] Well, yeah, I don't know if I would do this, but like, yeah, there's certain this, this kind of science fiction thing, that kind of science fiction thing.

[2040] It'd be a wild way to go out.

[2041] Yeah, it would be interesting.

[2042] Flip people right on their head.

[2043] Yeah, but look, at the end of the day, to me, at the end of the day, you're either doing it on set or you're not doing it.

[2044] You're either capturing it in camera or you're not.

[2045] And that's it.

[2046] It's about capturing it on camera.

[2047] It's not about coming up with a car chase with two unreal cars that were made in a computer.

[2048] No, it's about smashing metal into metal and see what the fuck happens.

[2049] And it's about real stunt people doing real shit.

[2050] Yeah.

[2051] All right.

[2052] And it's about building real sets, not like, well, a little bit of the set.

[2053] And then the rest is all created.

[2054] The rest is green screen.

[2055] No, I like building big sets.

[2056] I like doing things for real.

[2057] I mean, that means something.

[2058] you know, a movie like a movie that didn't get much respect when it came out but now in a world where like it probably never would have been done that way if done now that is really impressive is if you look at Remy Harlan's cutthroat island it's fucking amazing I mean especially in today's world I mean like they spent a lot of money on it was a big flop but man they do like magnificent actions scenes in it that are just fantastic and they're on real ships not some bullshit they're on a real ship and they build entire towns and have carrots chases through it and you know and you see Gina Davis practically break her fucking neck doing all this wild ass shit I mean that's a fucking movie yeah I'm not familiar with that yeah it was like this huge flop for Caracco but like you look at it now and it's just I mean it's terrific what year was this it's like 80 like 88 I mean 90 96 or something like that oh wow but there's this big chase a big carriage chase through this town in the movie that's just i mean it's just balls fucking out well i guess probably that that that's that's a big that's a big chase jesus christ and it's like fucking her like she's not holding the horses man yeah you can tell and there's a lot of wild explosions going on literally right behind her yeah and they think franklin jello's the bad guy and he's terrific in it yeah yeah Frank Langello.

[2059] Remember him from it?

[2060] Yeah.

[2061] He was Dracula.

[2062] Yeah, that's right.

[2063] He was a good Dracula, too.

[2064] He was a definitely good Dracula, too.

[2065] That movie had a good tagline.

[2066] It was like, the story of the greatest lover, whoever lived, died and lived again.

[2067] Speaking of Dracula, one of my favorite movies that you were in was you acting in Dust Till Dawn.

[2068] Oh, yeah, for Robert, yeah.

[2069] That was a fucking creepy character.

[2070] Yeah, that was a weird -ass character.

[2071] You played, and it was like, it was such a strange dynamic between you and George Clooney because George Clooney being your brother was trying to protect you, but you were clearly a fucking sociopathic, psychopathic murderer.

[2072] Yeah, absolutely.

[2073] And you played it so well.

[2074] Oh, thank you, mate.

[2075] When you were telling the girl that come sit on the bed, I was like, oh, Jesus.

[2076] I remember watching that.

[2077] And then, you know, it was, you played one of the creepiest fucking murderers in any movie ever.

[2078] And I played that character really seriously as far as, like, he's a schizophrenic.

[2079] Yeah.

[2080] And I tried to play that as realistically as possible.

[2081] But one of the things that was so funny is, like, you would see how fucking crazy I am, but then you would see George trying to take care of me. And you actually kind of almost had sympathy for, like, George's character.

[2082] Oh, look at that.

[2083] That's kind of sweet.

[2084] Oh, he just sliced that woman up.

[2085] Yeah.

[2086] Yeah.

[2087] But, like, you're, like, going, oh, when they hug each other.

[2088] It was very complicated.

[2089] Yeah.

[2090] Well, there's almost like, it's almost like two movies.

[2091] It's like, that movie is, like, this really tense, dramatic, dangerous movie with these really bad guys that have kidnapped this family.

[2092] And then all of a sudden it's a fucking crazy, funny vampire movie.

[2093] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2094] Like, out of nowhere, it becomes comical.

[2095] Yeah, exactly.

[2096] It was a weird movie.

[2097] Yeah, that's how it was all.

[2098] always supposed to be.

[2099] Did you enjoy that kind of acting?

[2100] Did you ever think of like doing more of that?

[2101] Well, I did think about doing more of that.

[2102] I'm kind of glad it didn't work out that way.

[2103] All right.

[2104] But that was the one that I really had a good time doing.

[2105] I really liked playing the character.

[2106] I loved working with Robert and I was one of the producers on the movie.

[2107] So it was just, it was great like being involved with the movie that I had written and that I was a producer on.

[2108] I was playing this wild character.

[2109] We had a lot of fun people making it.

[2110] The crew was great.

[2111] We just had a ball, but also it wasn't like my next movie as a director, so I didn't have to worry about shit.

[2112] Yeah.

[2113] I didn't have to worry about making my day or anything.

[2114] But it was also, you were really good at it.

[2115] Like, you've done cameos in your films, but it's, it's like funny.

[2116] Like, here's Quentin Tarantino in his movie.

[2117] Here's Quentin Tarantino, the bartender.

[2118] Yeah, yeah, and death proof.

[2119] Yeah.

[2120] But in that film, you were a pivotal key character, and it was very important that we believed you were out of your fucking mind.

[2121] Oh, yeah.

[2122] No, no. I think that's my best character.

[2123] work I ever did in a movie.

[2124] Look, I would have, look, admittedly, I would have liked to have done more of that, but they just didn't seem to be in the cards.

[2125] Is that anything that you would consider doing now?

[2126] Somebody contacted you?

[2127] Everyone's just, yeah, I don't think so.

[2128] I mean, like, I think everyone, like, everyone kind of jumps on it when I do anything like that, but also, time has kind of passed.

[2129] I don't want to be on somebody's stupid movie.

[2130] You know, I don't want to, like, don't, don't fax me fucking call sheets, and now I got to get up in the fucking morning.

[2131] That's hilarious.

[2132] And, like, you know, I've got a wife and a son.

[2133] I can spend nine hours a day on your stupid fucking movie.

[2134] I get it.

[2135] No, I get it completely.

[2136] There was a time, but that time has passed.

[2137] Right.

[2138] I actually had an interesting situation, though, because it was like, during that time, I was really looking for more roles, and they didn't really necessarily happen.

[2139] Then I go and do Kill Bill, and that Kill Bill is kind of what helped me get this attitude, because I was really putting myself really everything into Kill Bill.

[2140] And finally it was like, well, you know, of course I'm putting myself into it because everything means everything to me. So it's like, do I really want to be on a set where I don't care as much as this?

[2141] Well, the answer is probably no. But the thing is, okay, so I do kill Bill.

[2142] I'm a little heavy at that time.

[2143] And so I'm totally hating doing the press for Kill Bill 1 because I'm too heavy.

[2144] All right.

[2145] So then I'm editing Kill Bill 2.

[2146] And so I lose a bunch of weight and everything.

[2147] So I look much better.

[2148] And now I'm really looking forward to doing the talk show.

[2149] and doing the photo shoots because I feel better.

[2150] I feel better about myself.

[2151] And I go and I do the talk shows.

[2152] And I kill.

[2153] I absolutely kill.

[2154] I'm charming and I'm funny.

[2155] If you like me anyway, I do a good job.

[2156] And the talk shows really, I make a good impression.

[2157] Then all of a sudden, I start getting all these acting roles because I did so good on the talk shows.

[2158] And they're like legitimate acting roles with like some really like George Romero and Wim Wenders and all these like really kind of interesting stuff is coming down the coming down the pike and I got offered the main bad guy in this like Western with Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz that Luke Bisson was producing but at the time I started going out with Sophia Coppola and she was like what you're gonna like go and act in somebody's stupid movie no you're gonna take care of me I'm your girlfriend We're hanging out together You're not going to go to Arizona And do some stupid Western On somebody's fucking movie No, you're my boyfriend We're going to hang out together I go, yeah, you know you're right I'm in love, here we go Wow, that's interesting That she didn't want you to do it Well, yeah, well, but actually she made sense Like, yeah, you're right, I'm in love Why the fuck I'm going to run away For like four months?

[2159] Fuck that shit It's, well, the beautiful thing is you could do whatever you want You know, that's the beautiful thing thing and one of the things about your success it's been so unique is that you've been able to do whatever you want from the jump like it's just I'm just like really fortunate and like I just hope that but it's a lot of things well yeah not just fortune no no no no no I'm not throwing it out away no it is but what I guess my point is no I'm not just putting it up to luck I know what they say luck is when preparation and and an opportunity meet.

[2160] But I just hope that when, you know, it's said and done that this wonderful situation I had the people think that I handled it well.

[2161] I had a good situation and I lived up to it.

[2162] And I use it to its best advantage.

[2163] Do you ever speak to or in front of young filmmakers and try to impart your philosophy and your story and how you've, how you've, done this and how you managed to stay true to your vision.

[2164] I did earlier on, but while you're kind of still doing the vision, I think it's, you know, it's maybe something to do when you're a little older and then you kind of have more of the master classes and everything.

[2165] I think it's something, you know, I would be more comfortable talking about the career when it's in the river mirror.

[2166] But other than this here, I mean, have you done a long -form conversation like this before?

[2167] I haven't, like, I've, like, early in on my career, I did a couple of master classes, But then I just decided, no, save that, save that for later.

[2168] But if I was a young filmmaker, this would be so valuable for me. It's like if someone could sit down, listen to George Carlin, talk about how he wrote stand -up.

[2169] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2170] You know, or Richard Pryor.

[2171] Well, again, like I said, when it's in the rear of your mirror, I'll be more open to it.

[2172] Well, I'm just glad you did this.

[2173] Oh, thank you.

[2174] I don't know if this is a master class, but you've just been asking me interesting deep -tissue questions.

[2175] But it's, whether it's a master class or not, it's like people.

[2176] get insight into what it must have been like to be you to be this guy who's working at a video store who's just a massive fan of films because you just you would just watch all the films while you work there yeah right and then you decide well I had my I can't you know again we were living through this horrible time in the 80s so I was not seeing the movies that were in my head I was not seeing them reflected by the movies we were seeing you know you would see you would see one thing you would see like one scene like oh wow that was really interesting.

[2177] That was cutting edge.

[2178] But then usually they usually took it back, you know, a few scenes later.

[2179] I mean, it was funny.

[2180] I actually just was making a list the other day.

[2181] I was thinking it could be an interesting book to write because the cinema book I'm writing is about New Hollywood.

[2182] So it starts in 67 and ends in 81, which is, I think, with the end of the official New Hollywood.

[2183] But I was thinking about if I was going to write a cinema book that takes place during the 80s, which takes place during my video archives years.

[2184] I'd pick about 15 movies that we would call archive movie, video archive movies.

[2185] And wouldn't be talking about blue velvet or ET or like a lot of the set movies die hard that people love in the 80s.

[2186] Okay, those are what they are and they're terrific.

[2187] I'm putting them down.

[2188] But we were after a real chancy cinema with balls.

[2189] And this was a ballless decade.

[2190] but every once in a while a movie would pierce through and it would be like oh wow that was fucking terrific and you would see how the critics would like have a conniction about it and but like to us this was the real noise this was the shit and we loved it and it was something like year of the dragon would come out and that would be fantastic or Hal Ashby's 8 million ways to die with Jeff Bridges and Andy Garcia that was fucking fantastic or what was something else Paul Verhoven's Flesh plus blood with Rutger Hower that was that was fucking amazing Was to live in Dye in L .A. around that area?

[2191] To live in, yeah, to live in die in L .A. was during the time, Manhunter.

[2192] Oh, yeah, that's right.

[2193] Michael Mann's Manhunter.

[2194] The first of the...

[2195] Yeah, the first of the Hannibal Lecter thing.

[2196] Yeah.

[2197] And William Peterson just terrific as fucking Bill Graham.

[2198] Yeah.

[2199] You know, so like those were...

[2200] I was thinking about writing a book where it was like I would just deal with like those 15 movies because it's like they they just uh near dark katherine bigelow's vampire movie near dark that has like a great fucking massacre scene in the diner which was like oh my god that's like not vampires that's like the fucking manson family just walked into this bar and just massacred everybody bill paxton was great in that movie just fantastic it was a great movie it was a great movie now no scene was quite as good as the massacre scene but that it didn't have to be That massacre scene was great enough for, I saw that film five times just for that scene.

[2201] Yeah, a lot of people aren't even aware of that movie anymore, right?

[2202] Yeah, so it would be interesting to come from like this horrible decade and to pick out like the 15 movies.

[2203] That's for us, that that's what we're living for.

[2204] Yeah.

[2205] Now, the only movie that I saw back then that I would see scenes in movies, that it would be like, oh, I would like to do a scene like that or that would be cool.

[2206] But the only movie that kind of approximated the kind of movies that I later made or that I thought about or the movies I was making in my mind was Jim McBride's remake in 82.

[2207] Jim McBride's remake of Jean -Lou Goddard's Breathless, the Breathless with Richard Gear.

[2208] That was about as close to a Quentin movie as I had ever seen at the theaters.

[2209] because his character is a complete fucking asshole.

[2210] His character is really into rockabilly music.

[2211] I was really into rockabilly music at the time.

[2212] He was a fucking asshole.

[2213] He read comics all the time.

[2214] I read comics.

[2215] You know, my two passions were rockabilly music and comic books.

[2216] He read them both.

[2217] He was a huge fan of the Silver Surfer.

[2218] He kept talking about the Silver Surfer all the time.

[2219] They did these interesting distance.

[2220] They shot Los Angeles as if it was like a backlott studio.

[2221] You fell in love with Los Angeles again.

[2222] And, you know, again, he's just a dick.

[2223] And they do, like, cool shots, like process shots where it's just, obviously, it's fake.

[2224] You know, he's not really driving.

[2225] And it's, like, it's a phony process shot in the background.

[2226] But that's the point of it, is it supposed to be fake?

[2227] It was just, it was just awesome.

[2228] He would stop and sing Jerry Lee Lewis songs.

[2229] It was just fucking groovy, man. It was, like, that's what I'm looking for.

[2230] You are a fan of comic books.

[2231] Do you like comic book movies?

[2232] Uh, look, here's the thing.

[2233] Look, I've got, I've grown bored with a lot of them.

[2234] I mean, it would have been great if all this Marvel shit was happening when I was in my 20s and early 30s.

[2235] Yeah.

[2236] Like, what's happening now is what we wanted to happen in the 80s.

[2237] Right, right, right.

[2238] Okay.

[2239] So, but, you know, but, you know, they wait until I'm in my 50s and now I don't give so much of a shit about it anymore.

[2240] Yeah.

[2241] Um, one of the things that I've always said.

[2242] is no one has really done a true Robert E. Howard Conan movie.

[2243] Oh, no, they haven't.

[2244] They really haven't.

[2245] They never really nailed it.

[2246] And I was always secretly hoping that you would take over.

[2247] Well, Robert Rodriguez is the one who really wanted to do a Conan movie.

[2248] Did he really?

[2249] Yeah.

[2250] Yeah, because Robert Howard, he's like, hey, Robert E. Howard, he's a Texan.

[2251] Yeah.

[2252] You know, Conan is a Texas creation.

[2253] Yep.

[2254] you know and um if i did it would it would probably be a uh uh i love the comic series where they did the whole um um uh one of the short stories was like a queen of the golden pearl or whatever it is the one where the there's the one pirate queen that has all those black african guys as as as her crew well um they had conan meet her in one of the comic books and then But, you know, the entire journey that they have is a short story.

[2255] So you never learn about the entire journey.

[2256] You just learn how he gets with her and then how it ends.

[2257] Well, they did like a 20 -issue run where it was like for two years.

[2258] They just go through the entire voyage that he had with her in the comics.

[2259] And it's one of the greatest runs of the comic.

[2260] What year was this around?

[2261] Like, if I'm not mistaken, I think, around the height of the comic book's popularity.

[2262] So I'm thinking on like 77, 78.

[2263] I was really hoping.

[2264] It's like Queen of the Golden Pearl.

[2265] I can't remember the name of the story.

[2266] I was really hoping for the Jason Mamoa Conan.

[2267] Because I think if anybody represents what Conan was supposed to look like, it wouldn't be Arnold Schwarzenegger when he was a bodybuilder.

[2268] It would have been Jason Mamoa, especially after he got done playing Caldrago.

[2269] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2270] Now, here's the thing, though, about it.

[2271] I thought he did a pretty good job in that movie.

[2272] Yeah, the movie was just shit.

[2273] But here's the deal, though.

[2274] The kid playing Conan when he was a kid fucking killed it.

[2275] Yeah, he did kill it.

[2276] No, that opening 10 minutes is the Conan movie we always wanted.

[2277] Yeah, yeah.

[2278] That opening 10 minutes where he cuts all the guys fucking heads off and comes back.

[2279] That was the shit.

[2280] That's why I was so pumped for the movie.

[2281] And then I'm a big Jason Mamoa fan, especially from him from the Game of Thrones.

[2282] You see that character.

[2283] Like, that could be Conan.

[2284] Look, I have to say, look, I have affection for the John Milius one, because I like Miletus's philosophies that he keeps putting out there.

[2285] And I actually really like the sequel, the Conan the Destroyer, the one with Grace Jones.

[2286] That's the one that's most like the comic book.

[2287] And it's actually written by Gary Conway, the guys who wrote the comic book, Roy Thomas and Gary Conway.

[2288] So that's the one that actually feels like the comic book.

[2289] Right, yeah.

[2290] Because I love the, I'm a big fan of the comic book.

[2291] Oh, the comic book was excellent.

[2292] Yeah, the comic book's very excellent.

[2293] That's how I got into it.

[2294] Later in life, about like 10 years ago, I started reading the short stories.

[2295] Oh, really?

[2296] Yeah, yeah.

[2297] Robert E. Howard is such a complicated guy.

[2298] Yeah.

[2299] And killed himself in his really 30s, right?

[2300] Did you see that movie about him?

[2301] No, I didn't, but I heard it was really good.

[2302] Yeah, Vincent Donofrio plays him.

[2303] Was it good?

[2304] It was pretty good.

[2305] What is it called?

[2306] All this in the fireworks.

[2307] Oh, okay.

[2308] I'll check it out.

[2309] And he's like, it's kind of cool because he's got, I think it's Renee Zellooker in the film.

[2310] I mean, he's describing who Conan is.

[2311] It's like the 40s.

[2312] So, like, there's no frame of reference at all.

[2313] Yeah, right.

[2314] It is crazy that this one guy had this vision for these characters.

[2315] And he tried a couple other ones, too, right?

[2316] He had Call the Conqueror.

[2317] Yeah, yeah, Croll, and he had Red Sonia.

[2318] Mm -hmm, yeah.

[2319] But it was those movies just, I just don't think anybody's really nailed it.

[2320] Yeah.

[2321] If Robert Rodriguez, was he really interested in doing that?

[2322] He was going to do it.

[2323] Why doesn't he fucking do it?

[2324] I don't know.

[2325] You know, it's like, yeah, he had a couple things.

[2326] he wanted to do he wanted to do barborella for a while and he but he really wanted to do conan and like really the idea that that robert edhower was a texas artist that's a that's important to robert yeah that's important to represent texas and he loves the idea that conan is a texas that is pretty cool and robert rodriguez is the perfect guy to do it too you think about it if not you him yeah same sort of in my mind you know listen um i've taken up a lot of your time and i Really, really fucking appreciate you being here, man. Oh, it's my pleasure.

[2327] I had a really good time, man. I enjoyed it very much.

[2328] And your book, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, is out.

[2329] It's out right now.

[2330] Yes, June 29th.

[2331] That's when this plays, right?

[2332] Yeah, and is it, Jennifer Jason Lee is doing the...

[2333] She's doing the audio book, yeah.

[2334] Yeah, yeah.

[2335] I've listened to some of it.

[2336] It's very good.

[2337] Oh, good, cool, cool.

[2338] She's excellent.

[2339] Well, she's the fucking one of the greatest actresses in the world.

[2340] It's very cool that you got her to read it.

[2341] No, I was really, I asked her if she would do it, and she said she would.

[2342] It's the first time she's read a book before on tape.

[2343] Oh, really?

[2344] Yeah, so it's exciting.

[2345] Oh, that's so fucking cool that she was willing to do that for you.

[2346] Yeah, she was, yeah, she enjoyed it.

[2347] That's awesome.

[2348] Well, it's also really cool because, like, you know, her dad was Vic Morrow, so the thing about it is she knows all these actors, all the actors that are dropped from this era.

[2349] Like, she knew every one of them.

[2350] She didn't have to learn shit.

[2351] Right, right.

[2352] Now, that is cool.

[2353] Listen, man, like I said, it's an honor.

[2354] I really appreciate it.

[2355] My pleasure.

[2356] Good to be on here, mate.

[2357] Thank you very much.

[2358] All right.

[2359] That's it.

[2360] Bye, everybody.

[2361] Thank you.