Quentin Tarantino responds to Kanye West's claims he stole his idea for Django Unchained

Quentin Tarantino has responded to Kanye West’s claims that he came up with the idea of Django Unchained years before the movie was released.

In case you missed it, earlier this week West claimed he had mentioned the idea to Tarantino and Jamie Foxx while brainstorming together for his 'Gold Digger' video - and that Tarantino then ‘turned it into a film’.

Speaking on Piers Morgan Uncensored, he said: “Tarantino can write a movie about slavery where – actually him and Jamie, they got the idea from me because the idea for Django I pitched to Jamie Foxx and Quentin Tarantino as the video for 'Gold Digger'. And then Tarantino turned it into a film.”

However, Tarantino has now said that ‘didn’t happen’, saying he came up with the idea before he had even met West.

Abaca Press/Alamy Stock Photo

Appearing on Jimmy Kimmel Live on Thursday (27 October) he said: “There’s no truth to the idea that Kanye West came up with the idea of Django and then he told that to me, and I go, ‘Hey, wow, that’s a really great idea. Let me take Kanye’s idea and make Django Unchained out of it.’ That didn’t happen.

“I’d had the idea for Django for a while before I ever met Kanye. He wanted to do a giant movie version of The College Dropout [West’s first album] the way he did the album – so he wanted to get big directors to do different tracks from the album and then release it as this giant movie – not video, nothing as crass as videos, it was movies, movies based on each of the different tracks.

dpa picture alliance/Alamy Stock Photo

“We used it as an excuse to meet each other and and so we met each other we had a really good time. And he did have an idea for a video. I do think it was for the 'Gold Digger' video, that he would be a slave. And the whole thing was the slave narrative where he’s a slave and he’s singing 'Gold Digger'. And it was very funny. It was a really, really funny idea.”

West is currently facing a huge backlash after making antisemitic comments - in the past couple of weeks, he's lost his incredibly lucrative contract with Adidas, was dropped by talent agency CAA and had his waxwork removed from display at Madame Tussauds. An upcoming documentary about West was also shelved, despite already being completed.

Topics: US News, Kanye West, Quentin Tarantino, TV and Film

Claire Reid

Claire is a journalist at LADbible who, after dossing around for a few years, went to Liverpool John Moores University. She graduated with a degree in Journalism and a whole load of debt. When not writing words in exchange for money she is usually at home watching serial killer documentaries surrounded by cats. You can contact Claire at [email protected]