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Quentin Tarantino Reveals Why He Fired Actress on the Spot

The director has no patience for stars who skip a table read.

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Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino reveals why he suddenly fired French actress Isabelle Huppert while making Inglourious Basterds. In the behind-the-scenes new book, The Making of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino says he fired Huppert, originally cast as Madame Ada Mimieux, because she missed a table read. “She didn’t show up, so f--- it. I fired her,” the director said, according to an excerpt published by People. “I mean, I love Isabelle Huppert—Heaven’s Gate and all that—but there were issues with her contract. It just kept stalling. And then not coming to the table read. Well, we cast Maggie Cheung instead,” Tarantino continued. ”As far as I’m concerned, if you’re cast and you are not at that table, I don’t owe you jack s--t! You can be fired, especially if I get excited by what somebody else did in your absence.” During editing, Cheung’s scenes were cut after Tarantino decided the character wasn’t needed in the story.