Samuel L. Jackson has been discussing his role in Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained as the house-slave Stephen, as well as his working relationship with the director.
“I read it straight through, laughed and thought, ‘This is going to be fun’,” says Jackson. He then went on to explain how he interpreted his character to Quentin after reading the script. “[I said] ‘ Well, this Django character was written 15 years too late for me, so you do want me to play the most hated negro in cinematic history, right? It was like, ‘Ok, I’m down with that. Let’s see what happens.’”
Jackson then reveals that audiences will despise his character, but could have hated him even more in Tarantino had kept in further material.
“A lot of stuff I wash was still in the movie,” he remarked. “That’s who we are, we’re actors. Every scene I shot I still want in the movie, but they’re not. [Stephen] would be a lot more despicable if some of these scenes were still in the movie.”
Jackson then added, “We’ll just have to wait for the five hour director’s cut.” Django Unchained has been heralded as Tarantino’s greatest film for over a decade by critics.
Time Magazine critic Richard Corliss stated , regarding the movie, “A pastiche that’s nearly as funny as it is long, and quite as politically troubling as it may be liberating, Django Unchained is pure, if not great Tarantino. At 49, after eight features, the writer-director has become his genre.” Django Unchained is released on Christmas Day.
