Tarantino & DiCaprio talk Once Upon A Time in Hollywood at CinemaCon

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Last night during the Sony presentation at CinemaCon, Tom Rothman brought out both Quentin Tarantino and Leondardo DiCaprio to end their presentation with a bang to discuss ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD. While Tarantino was tight-lipped about plot details, he did reveal that the film would, in fact, star both DiCaprio and Brad Pitt (no mention of Margot Robbie) and would take place in 1969 during the Hollywood revolution

“In 2019 at the end of the summer, August, as they’re setting off the last explosion of the last franchise movie of the summer, Sony and myself will be coming to the theaters with the most exciting star dynamic duo since Robert Redford and Paul Newman. Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.”

Tarantino continued:

“It all is very hush-hush and top secret and under wraps. So, I can’t really go into any big details of the story. But, what I can tell you is that Once Upon A Time In Hollywood takes place during the Hollywood era of 1969. It takes place at the height of the counterculture explosion. It takes place at the time of the hippie revolution and it takes place at the height of new Hollywood. And, during this summer, little by little, block by block, we will be transforming Los Angeles into the psychadelic era of Hollywood in 1969 to be prepared for 2019.”

DiCaprio commented afterwards, saying:

“It’s hard to speak about a film that we haven’t done yet. We haven’t shot a frame on, but I’m incredibly excited, like I’m sure many of you are, to see a new Quentin Tarantino movie. I’m a huge fan of this guy. Very excited to work with Brad Pitt on this film and I think that he’s [Tarantino] gonna transport us into a different era-I’m a huge fan of SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN, for example. Movies about Hollywood. the backstory and the mechanics of how Hollywood works. As an L.A. native being immersed in this era and time and the way he’s gonna do it with such incredible authenticity and I can tell you having read the script already it’s one of the most amazing screenplays he’s ever written and that’s saying a lot because he’s done some masterworks in cinema history. So, I’m very excited to work on the film and we’re gonna do our best job to make it fantastic and I think we will.”

Tarantino also clarified that this was in fact a themed film with his usual assortment of characters:

“This is probably the closest to PULP FICTION I’ve done, as opposed to a movie that really is a Los Angeles movie and it deals with a couple of lead characters, but a lot of wild supporting characters that kind of make a blanket throughout the town.”

Tarantino closed out the presentation, saying: “I love movies and I love movies in movie theaters. They are my favorite place in the world.”

ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD hits theaters in August 2019.