Uma Thurman accused Quentin Tarantino of ‘trying to kill’ her while filming famous scene in ‘Kill Bill’
Uma Thurman said she almost died while filming a particular scene for the Kill Bill franchise, and claimed series director Quentin Tarantino was partly to blame.
Having debuted on our screens over two decades ago, Kill Bill quickly garnered a dedicated fan base who were all in for the mad action - though the franchise didn't come without its controversy.
In 2018, Thurman released footage of a car crash on the set of Kill Bill: Vol. 2 in Mexico back in 2004 that left her with severe injuries.
While the actor refused to lay the blame on Tarantino publicly at the time, she did later say on Instagram that 'the circumstances of this event were negligent to the point of criminality'.
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Thurman went on to say Tarantino 'was deeply regretful and remains remorseful about this sorry event, and gave me the footage years later so I could expose it and let it see the light of day'.
Over a decade after the accident in 2018, Thurman sat down with the New York Times for an interview, in which she spoke of how she felt she had been pushed 'to the point of death' after being asked to drive a stunt car for the second movie - something she wasn't comfortable doing.
"Quentin came in my trailer and didn’t like to hear no, like any director. He was furious because I’d cost them a lot of time. But I was scared," the 62-year-old recalled.
"He said: ‘I promise you the car is fine. It’s a straight piece of road. Hit 40 miles per hour or your hair won’t blow the right way and I’ll make you do it again'. But that was a deathbox that I was in. The seat wasn’t screwed down properly. It was a sand road, and it was not a straight road."
Speaking of the incident itself, Thurman added: "The steering wheel was at my belly and my legs were jammed under me. I felt this searing pain and thought, ‘Oh my God, I’m never going to walk again'.
"When I came back from the hospital in a neck brace with my knees damaged and a large massive egg on my head and a concussion, I wanted to see the car and I was very upset."
She recalled having an 'enormous fight' with Tarantino, and even accused the director of trying to kill her.
"Quentin and I had an enormous fight, and I accused him of trying to kill me," she said. "He was very angry at that, I guess understandably, because he didn’t feel he had tried to kill me.
Thurman and Tarantino have since worked things out, and the Pulp Fiction director told Deadline that Thurman reached out to him prior to the publication of the New York Times article.
The Once Upon a Time in Hollywood director also recalled the day of the crash and how he instructed Thurman to drive the opposite direction on the 'straight road' due to lighting preferences.
Such a move is one of the 'biggest regrets' of the filmmaker's life.
"I thought, a straight road is a straight road and I didn’t think I needed to run the road again to make sure there wasn’t any difference, going in the opposite direction," he said.
"Again, that is one of the biggest regrets of my life."
Topics: Quentin Tarantino, Film and TV
Callum Jones