Will Smith Explains Why He Didn’t “Lead” ‘DJANGO UNCHAINED’
I still stand behind the opinion that Christoph Waltz should not have won Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars this year. Aside from my belief that Philip Seymour Hoffman was more deserving of the award for his performance in The Master, I feel Walt’s character was not a supporting character. Dr. Schultz was the lead and Django was the supporting character. If you can look past the fact that his name is in the title and really just look at the film you might agree with me on this. Either way, it seems that I wasn’t the only one who felt this way. In a recent interview with EW.com, Will Smith – who you may remember was originally to star as the title character – reveals that he butted heads with director Quentin Tarantino because he felt the character was secondary to Walt’s Schultz.
BE WARNED: IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE FILM, DO NOT READ THE SECOND STATEMENT FOUND BELOW.
“Django wasn’t the lead, so it was like, I need to be the lead. The other character was the lead!”
The actor apparently even “pleaded” with the director to be more of a central character in the film before leaving the project.
“I was like, ‘No, Quentin, please, I need to kill the bad guy!’”
While that last statement comes across as more of an ego driven demand than an issue with the script, I agree with Smith’s sentiment. I am not going to fault Smith for backing out of the project because he felt secondary to Waltz if that is how he feels. Foxx stepping into the role was a happy accident if y0u ask me; even if he wasn’t the star of the show.
Michael Haffner
Somewhere between growing up on a steady diet of Saturday morning trips to the local comic-book shop, collecting an unhealthy amount of action figures, and frequent viewings of Ray Harryhausen and Hammer Horror films, came forth a nerdy boy that was torn between journalism and the arts. In high school, Michael found himself writing a movie column for the school newspaper. Yet, he went on to get a BFA in Studio Art at Webster University. When not writing about films, you can still find him discussing classic horror, collecting action figures, and reading Batman. Clearly, not much has changed.
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Will Smith Explains Why He Didn’t “Lead” ‘DJANGO UNCHAINED’
I still stand behind the opinion that Christoph Waltz should not have won Best Supporting Actor at t