'The Uma Thurman thing' gave Robbie pause.
Working with Quentin Tarantino on Once Upon a Time in Hollywood was a complicated decision for Margot Robbie.
The 28-year-old actress covers the July issue of Vogue, and inside the magazine, she opens up about her dream to work with Tarantino -- and how "the Uma Thurman thing" gave her pause.
After completing her work in I, Tonya -- for which she earned an Oscar nomination -- Robbie finally felt confident in her acting abilities to reach out to Tarantino about possibly working with him. She had been a longtime fan of his movies, and wrote him a letter asking to collaborate in "any capacity," she tells the outlet. Robbie then signed on to play Sharon Tate in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Tarantino's first film not produced by Harvey Weinstein.
The movie is also Tarantino's first since the #MeToo movement and Uma Thurman's allegations of assault against Weinstein (he has denied all wrongdoing) and claims that Tarantino forced her into a dangerous car crash on the set of 2003's Kill Bill, for which she had asked for a stunt double. She also said for scenes in the movie, Tarantino had insisted on spitting on her and choking her with a chain himself. The director has called the car crash "one of the biggest regrets of my life." He later cast Thurman's daughter, Maya Hawke, in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
Robbie tells Vogue that she was reassured by Tarantino's statement on the crash, and by the fact that he had helped make the footage public. "But the thought definitely crossed my mind. Like, will people view this decision as conflicting with what I’m doing on the producing side?" she asks. Robbie started her production company, LuckyChap Entertainment, with the hope of producing female-driven projects.
“I don't know," she continues. "I don't know how to say what I feel about it, because I'm so grateful to be in a position of power and to have more creative control when that is embraced and encouraged now. At the same time, I grew up adoring movies that were the result of the previous version of Hollywood, and aspiring to be a part of it, so to have those dreams come true also feels incredibly satisfying. I don’t know. Maybe I'm having my cake and eating it too..."
Robbie says "it would be easier, and so much more unfulfilling, not to have a production company. To not hire first- and second-time female directors, and stake millions of other people's money, and put my name to it and everything I've worked for."
"But I've made the choice to do it, and I don’t regret it. On the flip side -- and it doesn’t even feel like a flip side -- it was my lifelong dream [to work with Tarantino], and I got to do it, and it makes me sad if people might hold that against me despite everything else I'm doing," she adds.
"Quentin told me, 'You will never have more fun on a movie set.' And he was right. I had the greatest experience of my life," Robbie recalls. "There are some aspects of old Hollywood that are really wonderful and important and should be carried over. Do you erase history because there were some bad parts? Maybe it's important for us at this juncture to acknowledge the good parts as well."
See more on Robbie in the video below.
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