Quentin Tarantino Has Responded To Uma Thurman’s Allegations About Her “Kill Bill” Car Crash
It’s probably safe to say that Quentin Tarantino’s phone was blowing up on Saturday (and for once it wasn’t the slew of push notifications from SoleSlobbers.com). The New York Times dropped an interview with Uma Thurman in which she finally spoke about her awful experiences with Harvey Weinstein, and she talked about QT as well. Uma accused Quentin of being a major asshole on the set of Kill Bill and Kill Bill 2, like enthusiastically standing in for Michael Madsen to spit on and choke her, and forcing her to drive (and subsequently crash) a stunt car. Oh, and trying to hide the evidence of said crash for 15 years. Quentin has recently spoken to Deadline in an attempt to defend himself.
Quentin begins by saying he knew Uma was speaking with The Times, and he “very happily” provided footage of the car crash to her to help aid her piece and provide her some “closure.” He claims that Uma had other people involved in her alleged car crash “cover up,” and that Quentin was scheduled to speak with author Maureen Dowd to back-up her claims. But he and Maureen never spoke, and it appeared as though he was the one shouldering all the blame. He believes it’s because everyone else Uma named had “lawyered up.” Specifically, production managers Bennett Walsh and Lawrence Bender.
Quentin adds that he never forced Uma into the car, and he certainly never screamed at her in her trailer. Instead, he drove the car himself as a test, assuring Uma it was an easy drive, and that she “trusted” him enough to do it. He also swears she was only driving about 35-40 miles per hour. But when it came time for shooting, the light was different from his test drive, and he chose to have Uma drive the opposite way. That’s when she hit a curve and crashed. He says:
“I thought, a straight road is a straight road and I didn’t think I needed to run the road again to make sure there wasn’t any difference, going in the opposite direction. Again, that is one of the biggest regrets of my life.”
Uma believed that the footage of the crash was held back from her so that she couldn’t sue for the damage done to her knees and back. Quentin implies that was all Harvey’s decision, as was the shady decision to have the damaged stunt car destroyed (something he believes was carried out by Bennett Walsh and Lawrence Bender). Uma posted the video yesterday with further explanation, and she too would like you to know that Quentin was very helpful in providing the footage. She puts the blame squarely on Harvey Weinstein, Bennett Walsh, and Lawrence Bender.
About the spitting, Quentin met the question with a question, which was: “What’s the fucking problem?” When suggested that the context was pretty gross, Quentin responded that he didn’t trust Michael Madsen to do it right. As for choking her, he said he was going for realism, which is why he was the one to do it. Like, Quentin really wanted to choke Uma. He also explained his decision to choke Diane Kruger in Inglourious Basterds, saying that he wanted it to look like she was really losing air and that she agreed because she trusted him. Are we sure his thing is feet and not necks?
Quentin says that he and Uma are good now, and have been talking ever since her piece with The Times came out. He also plays the “poor QT” card by saying he’s left to represent everyone involved in this mess, since no one else (like Harvey, Bennett, or Lawrence) are speaking. Not speaking? Hmmm…maybe something Quentin should consider. Audio of Quentin strongly defending Roman Polanski from a 2003 Howard Stern interview has recently resurfaced, in which he claims it wasn’t rape-rape and that Roman Polanski’s 13-year-old accuser “wanted it.” Are Harvey, Bennett, and Lawrence still in the business of making pieces of junk disappear? Just asking.
Pic: Wenn.com