Quentin Tarantino reveals how Roman Polanski reacted to Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
The French-Polish director, who is Sharon Tate's widower, appears as a character in the new film
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Your support makes all the difference.Quentin Tarantino has revealed how Roman Polanski reacted to discovering he would be a character in his new film.
The director’s next feature, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, stars Margot Robbie as Sharon Tate, who was married to Polanski and pregnant with his child at the time of her murder in August 1969.
Tarantino’s now discussed what happened when the French-Polish filmmaker cottoned on to the fact he was to address the tragedy in the film.
According to Tarantino, Polanski contacted him through a friend to ask about the project.
“That friend called me and said, ‘So, what’s up with this?’“ Tarantino told Deadline. ”He said that Roman wasn’t mad. He didn’t call up irate or anything. He was just curious.“
He added: “So what I did was…Roman’s obviously stuck in Europe. I had the friend come over and read the script. He came to my house. He read the script simply so he could call Roman up and tell him the idea and what’s in it. And basically that he didn’t have anything to worry about.”
Tarantino also explained why he didn’t feel the need to contact Polanski about writing him into his film.
Polanski lives in Europe due to fleeing in America after pleading guilty to statutory rape in 1977.
“I felt that the story of [Sharon’s] death, and the Manson tragedy had moved into legit history, so it actually is of historical importance beyond just his own personal tragedy,” the director said. “So I felt I was on OK grounds there. I didn’t want to call him and talk to him while I was writing it because I’m not going to ask him permission. I’m going to do it, all right? I don’t think he needed any anxiety and I didn’t need any anxiety as far as that was concerned.”
Once upon a Time in Hollywood is released in the UK on 14 August.
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