Quentin Tarantino shelves THE HATEFUL EIGHT after "betrayal" leads to script leak

It’s barely been a week since we heard that Quentin Tarantino had plans (to paraphrase the Pet Shop Boys) to go west again with The Hateful Eight, but now in a surprising turn of events, the Oscar winning director has decided to shelve the highly anticipated western completely. And all because some people in Hollywood can’t be trusted.

Speaking to Deadline, Tarantino revealed that he had given the recently completed first draft of the script to a small circle of actors, but that one of them had been the cause of the script leaking to just about everybody in Hollywood, resulting in Tarantino’s agent suddenly being inundated with calls from other actors wanting a part in the movie.

“I’m very, very depressed. I finished a script, a first draft, and I didn’t mean to shoot it until next winter, a year from now. I gave it to six people, and apparently it’s gotten out today.”

“I gave it to one of the producers on Django Unchained, Reggie Hudlin, and he let an agent come to his house and read it. That’s a betrayal, but not crippling because the agent didn’t end up with the script. There is an ugly maliciousness to the rest of it. I gave it to three actors: Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, Tim Roth. The one I know didn’t do this is Tim Roth. One of the others let their agent read it, and that agent has now passed it on to everyone in Hollywood. I don’t know how these fucking agents work, but I’m not making this next.”

You may have realized that a certain name was missing from that list: Christoph Waltz. It had been previously reported that Waltz would be teaming up with Tarantino for a third time on Hateful Eight, but the director confirmed that that was not the case, when he continued pointing out suspects.

“I hadn’t given it to Christoph, I haven’t given it to Sam Jackson. I gave it to three motherfucking actors. We met in a place, and I put it in their hands. Reggie Hudlin’s agent never had a copy. It’s got to be either the agents of Dern or Madsen. Please name names.”

Tarantino revealed that his angry response to this was more about the betrayal than the actual act of the script getting out, something that would probably have been an inevitability. Thus he’s decided to instead get ahead of the whole mess and just publish the script as a book.

“I’m going to publish it, and that’s it for now. I give it out to six people, and if I can’t trust them to that degree, then I have no desire to make it. I’ll publish it. I’m done. I’ll move on to the next thing. I’ve got 10 more where that came from.”

“I could totally change my mind; I own the fucking thing. But I can tell you, it’s not going to be the next thing I do. It’s my baby, and if the muse calls me later to do it, we’ll do it. I was thinking about the idea of maybe publishing it before I made it, but now that deal happens for sure, and I’m not doing it next.”

“I am not talking out of both sides of my mouth, because I do like the fact that everyone eventually posts it, gets it and reviews it on the net. Frankly, I wouldn’t want it any other way. I like the fact that people like my shit, and that they go out of their way to find it and read it. But I gave it to six motherfucking people! Starting this week, I’ll be setting meetings with publishers.”

Having absolutely loved what Tarantino did with Django Unchained, I was pretty damn excited to see what he could do now with an ensemble western. Unfortunately, that’s not to be. And while, as a seriously bibliophile, I definitely don’t mind this script being novelized, it is a tad bit disappointing as super slow motion bullet wounds erupting buckets of blood is just not as cool in text.

Last Updated: January 22, 2014