By Quentin Tarantino | Famous Director
Man, when you work as hard as I do and make great movies like Django and others, it’s really fun. Every movie I have made so far has been terrific, but man—and this is very hard for me to say—I really dropped the ball with Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
43 minutes and 27 seconds into my movie, there’s a scene where Margot Robbie walks down Hollywood Boulevard, past all the cool movie theaters (I love movie theaters). Everything looks exactly the way it did in 1969 (the year my movie is set)… except for one thing.
I fired him, because I wouldn’t let his laziness compromise the integrity of my movie being really cool.
I wanted the streets to be a little bit dusty, so I told my set decorator to bring in some authentic Hollywood Boulevard dust from 1969 to spread around. He said, “Quentin, I don’t know where I’m supposed to find that,” so I fired him, because I wouldn’t let his laziness compromise the integrity of my movie being really cool. But even after suspending production for two weeks, nobody was able to find the dust I wanted, so I made the hardest decision I’ve ever made, man: I shrugged my shoulders and moved on with production.
I hoped no one would notice, but then, during my special premiere tradition (because it’s my 9th movie, I watched it nine times a day for nine days), I realized that the dust definitely looks more like 1980 dust than 1969 dust, and probably from a totally different area – maybe Orange County. It totally ruined the scene, even though the rest of the movie is really cool. I asked a bunch of friends about it, and they all said, “I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about, Quentin,” but I think they only said that to make me stop calling them at 4 a.m.
I know this will take off when the press inevitably catches on, so I wanted to get out ahead of this news and—for the first time ever—personally apologize. I know everyone’s going to watch my new movie and say, “Man, Quentin used to be a really cool director, but now we all know he sucks and he doesn’t even know what Hollywood was like in 1969.” That is why I am beginning reshoots of every scene in the movie, start to finish, right after I finish my daily Kill Bill Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 matinee double feature. ♦
Out of respect, Nathan Mostow kept his eyes closed for the entire Hollywood Boulevard scene, but thought the rest of the movie was “really cool, man.”