Michael Searles
Quentin Tarantino’s continued use of the N-word in his films is “racist and creepy”, according to Pulp Fiction actress Rosanna Arquette.
The film director’s continued use of the word in his work has split opinion since the 1990s.
Reflecting on the 1994 classic Pulp Fiction, Arquette questioned why the 62-year-old had been given a “hall pass” to use it in his work.
Arquette had a minor but memorable role in the film, playing the wife of a drug dealer and telling John Travolta’s character, Vincent Vega, that she had pierced her tongue as a “sex thing”.
Arquette told The Sunday Times: “It’s iconic, a great film on a lot of levels. But personally, I am over the use of the N-word – I hate it. I cannot stand that he [Tarantino] has been given a hall pass. It’s not art, it’s just racist and creepy.”
Tarantino’s scripts, including Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown and Django Unchained, have featured characters who often use the N-word during dialogue, but he has defended this in the past as being authentic to the story.
Fellow filmmakers Spike Lee and Lee Daniels have criticised him for overly focusing on the word and the casualness with which it is used, questioning whether it is necessary.
However, actors such as Jamie Foxx and Samuel L. Jackson, who are frequent collaborators of Tarantino, have regularly jumped to the defence of the filmmaker.
Last year, Foxx told Vanity Fair about how Leonardo DiCaprio has struggled with saying the N-word, which is used about 100 times in the 2012 film Django Unchained.
“I told Leo that in slavery days we would never talk to each other,” Foxx said. “I’m not your friend. I’m not Jamie Foxx. I’m Django. And I told him, you won’t really be able to play that character until you understand what slavery is about.”
Jackson previously said that he and Tarantino told DiCaprio that he had to say the N-word even if it made him uncomfortable.
“Every time someone wants an example of overuse of the N-word, they go to Quentin – it’s unfair,” Jackson told The New York Times. “He’s just telling the story, and the characters do talk like that. When Steve McQueen does it, it’s art. He’s an artiste. Quentin’s just a popcorn filmmaker.”
Arquette’s criticism comes just weeks after John Davidson, a Tourette syndrome campaigner, yelled the N-word at the BAFTA awards while actors Delroy Lindo and Michael B. Jordan were on stage during the ceremony.
Davidson, who was the inspiration behind the BAFTA-winning film I Swear, said the BBC should have done more to protect him, knowing that the condition causes involuntary tics.
On Instagram, Foxx said Davidson’s outburst was “unacceptable” and that “out of all the words you could’ve said, Tourette’s made you say that”. The actor added that he “meant that”.
Explaining how Davidson’s remark was broadcast by the BBC despite a two-hour time delay, Tim Davie, the broadcaster’s outgoing director-general, said staff editing the program had only heard one of the two occasions when it was shouted out.
