Director Quentin Tarantino appeared on MSNBC on Wednesday, November 4, to defend his recent comments about police brutality.
Tarantino told host Chris Haynes that he wasn’t making a blanket statement about police but was referring to specific incidents, like those involving the deaths of Sam DuBose and Eric Garner.
Tarantino admitted that he wasn’t expecting to experience backlash, with cop unions threatening to boycott his films.
“I was surprised,” said the director. “I was under the impression that I was an American, and that I had First Amendment rights, and there was no problem with me going to a police brutality protest and speaking my mind.”
Tarantino explained that the company releasing his forthcoming film The Hateful Eight — which is The Weinstein Co., although he didn’t mention the name — has not pressured him into apologizing in order to help the film’s box-office potential.
“They stand behind me,” Tarantino said, pointing out that the same company also released 2013’s Fruitvale Station, about a 2009 incident in which a man was killed by a police officer.
The controversy stems from Tarantino’s involvement in a Oct. 24 rally in New York City against police brutality. “When I see murders, I do not stand by,” Tarantino said at the event. “I have to call a murder a murder, and I have to call the murderers the murderers.”
On Monday, The Weinstein Co., which is releasing the Kurt Russell-starring The Hateful Eight on December 25, stood by the filmmaker. “The Weinstein Co. has a long-standing relationship and friendship with Quentin and has a tremendous amount of respect for him as a filmmaker,” a Weinstein Co. representative told The Hollywood Reporter in a statement.