Walton Goggins Shared He Wasn’t Comfortable With a Lot of Actors in ‘The Hateful Eight’
Actor Walton Goggins collaborated with Quentin Tarantino for the 2015 feature The Hateful Eight. And although he had a good time on set, Goggins asserted that the experience could be a bit nerve-racking due to who he worked with.
How Walton Goggins felt about working alongside his ‘Hateful Eight’ co-stars
Goggins and Tarantino already collaborated before the 2015 movie The Hateful Eight. The pair worked together on Django Unchained, where the pair became familiar with each other on set. But beyond Django, Tarantino was also a fan of Goggins’ work on Justified. Given how much he enjoyed the actor’s performance, there was little wonder as to why Tarantino would recruit Goggins again for The Hateful Eight.
But Hateful Eight would have Goggins act alongside even more star-power than Django Unchained did. And Goggins admitted that could be overwhelming at times.
“I wasn’t comfortable with Kurt Russell, or Jennifer Jason Leigh, or Tim [Roth], or Michael [Madsen] for that matter! Those are people who loom large in my imagination. Then you come into their space, and you come with an open heart and a vulnerability, and a willingness to play. They see that, and you can transcend being an actor working with another actor,” Goggins once told The Playlist.
His Django Unchained co-star was the only cast member that Goggins felt comfortable around.
“Over the course of this experience — and the only reason I didn’t include Sam Jackson in that list before is that Sam is my buddy. I know Sam,” he said. “Coming into this I didn’t know everybody else, and we very quickly got over the dogs sniffing each other part. And they all knew each other. Tim has known Sam a long time, Tim and Michael have been friends since the beginning. So everybody kinda had their experience, including Demian Bichir. Get the fuck out of here — that’s Demian Bichir standing there!”
Walton Goggins on what was unusual about his ‘Hateful Eight’ cast
It turned out that Goggins’ Hateful Eight crew went out of their way to make Goggins comfortable on set. The stars invited Goggins to dinner, helping him break the ice.
“It turned into a celebration of each others’ gifts, and how those gifts would be in service of Quentin Tarantino’s story. Everybody has a moment. The way Quentin builds his stories, everybody is three-dimensional. Even the guy who just walks in and says nothing,” Goggins said.
The Sons of Anarchy star asserted that this created a very collaborative environment that fostered respect.
“So in this movie, whenever it was Jennifer’s turn, or Sam’s turn, or Bruce [Dern]’s, we all got to be in the room,” he said. “And we were all in the room, even if we weren’t in the shot, we were all in the room to watch it. We were on the sidelines just watching it happen, and watching Quentin collaborate with them. And it was a real f***ing celebration of Quentin’s material and the story, and quite honestly, of each other. Respect is probably the most important word I can use. And the elements, because it was f***ing cold! We took care of each other.”
The bond Goggins experienced with the cast led to something the actor felt was pretty much unheard of. After filming wrapped on a movie, usually the cast went their separate ways. But the Justified star and his team kept in touch even after shooting Hateful Eight.
“It doesn’t happen ever. Seven months after you wrap a movie, you have the likes of the people in this cast, from Kurt to Sam [Jackson] to Jennifer [Jason Leigh] to Tim [Roth] to Demián [Bichir], all in different countries, texting 30 times a day? Come on, man,” Goggins said in a 2015 interview with Vulture. “That doesn’t happen with friends you’ve had for 20 years! It’s very real, and it’s very unique. I think we just all respect each other so much, and respect Quentin, and respect the opportunity to make this movie, and what we went through to make this movie.”
