What attracted you to the role of Broomhilda?
I wanted to be a part of this incredible project that represents a painful part of US history but also creates a hero out of it. There were people who fought for freedom and rebelled but we don’t hear those stories. This is obviously not a documentary or a true story but it’s exciting to watch Jamie become this badarse cowboy hero.
Revenge tale that it is, there’s also a love story at the core of Django.
Quentin was always saying to Jamie, “Don’t forget, this is a love story.” I think one of the great things about Quentin is that he’s so complicated as a human being. He is so excited about these exploitation films and yet so believes in the real humanity of people. He is so into blood and gore but such a romantic. These seemingly contradictory ideas that he embodies so fluidly are why his films are so great – because he’s paying attention to both of those aspects.
Do you reckon watching this is a decent way to educate people about African-American history?
We don’t deal openly with the reality of what was done. Partly because it’s so uncomfortable. It’s so horrific. It would take a director like Tarantino, who’s not afraid of that level of violence, to even tell the story. It was that bad. We tend to think, “No, that’s just sci-fi fantasy shit.” We all should have seen this coming, though. When you kill off Hitler in a movie,
your next project is going to be this.
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