The five actors Quentin Tarantino pointlessly interviewed for ‘Django Unchained’: “I didn’t need to do that”
Unlike most filmmakers, Quentin Tarantino doesn’t typically audition actors for a role in his movies. Instead, he either writes characters with a specific person in mind or asks them to play it in the hopes they say yes, which they usually do because he’s Quentin Tarantino.
Of course, that isn’t always the case. The filmmaker claims he was prepared to abandon Inglourious Basterds altogether after an exhaustive search for the perfect Hans Landa failed to yield a worthy candidate until Christoph Waltz blew everyone away and ultimately won an Academy Award.
Not many performers decline his advances, with Mickey Rourke and Sylvester Stallone the only ones to do it twice, but it can’t be a nice feeling to hold a meeting with Tarantino about potentially playing the lead in his next picture, only for the writer and director to render it an entirely futile and pointless exercise by hiring Jamie Foxx for Django Unchained without even having to audition.
Everyone knows that Will Smith was in talks with Tarantino about the part before he decided it wasn’t in his best interests, but what wasn’t as well-publicised was the quintet the Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction mastermind was planning to test after lengthy one-to-one meetings who had their hopes dashed in an instant when Foxx went to his house, read the script, and pretty much agreed to do it on the spot.
It’s easy to imagine Smith in the title role had things gone to plan, and it’s not a stretch to envision Idris Elba doing it, either. However, Tyrese Gibson is definitely a stretch, as are Chris Tucker and Terrence Howard. Of the five, Michael K Williams definitely would have been the most interesting, not that any of them were given a fair shake once Foxx entered the picture.
“I met six different actors and had extensive meetings with all of them, and I went in-depth on all of their work,” Tarantino explained, per Entertainment Weekly. “They all appreciated the material, and I was going to put them through the paces, make them go off against one another and kind of put up an obstacle course. And then I met Jamie and realised I didn’t need to do that.”
Howard might be an Academy Award nominee who devised a mathematical equation that multiplies one by one and comes up with two, but it’s hard to buy him as Django. Tyrese isn’t even a good actor, so that would never have panned out. Tucker doesn’t make a lot of movies, but he did have the Jackie Brown connection with Tarantino, who also has a habit of drawing unexpected performances from certain stars.
If it wasn’t Foxx or even Smith, then Elba and Williams were undoubtedly the standout candidates. Unfortunately, they didn’t even get the chance to prove it.
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