Russell snarls back to stardom
HATEFUL EIGHT: Career again in full swing with gonzo performance in new Tarantino film
LOS ANGELES — Fifty-three years ago, as a feisty kid of 11, Kurt Russell kicked Elvis Presley in the shins during his uncredited cameo in the King’s crop-duster pilot movie It Happened at the World’s Fair.
At the age of 64, Russell smashes Jennifer Jason Leigh’s character in the chops with his elbow after she mouths off in Quentin Tarantino’s new revenge western The Hateful Eight.
His gonzo performance as a bounty hunter in Tarantino’s bloodsplattered opus is yet more proof that Russell — who once memorably played Presley in the 1979 TV movie Elvis and briefly did his voice in Forrest Gump — is in the midst of a spectacular career revival.
Not that he has to be violent to pull the feat off. Russell was all sleek and witty and clever as the influential Mr. Nobody in Furious 7. I expect to see more of him in that franchise. Meanwhile, there are delicious rumours that Russell has a role in Vol. 2 of Guardians of the Galaxy, a series that echoes the offbeat action humour that Russell himself perfected in the 1986 cult classic Big Trouble in Little China.
But it is worth noting that despite being a big star in the 1980s and into the ’90s, Russell’s career waned during the new millennium. Tarantino was in part responsible for the resurgence.
In his 2007 Grindhouse movie Death Proof, Russell was wildly entertaining as the Hollywood serial killer Stuntman Mike. While the overall two-movie package was disappointing, Russell held his own as a rediscovered talent. It just took some time before he really burst out again in 2015.
The Hateful Eight seems perfect for Russell, who has always had an interest in the western genre. He played Wyatt Earp in Tombstone (1993) and more recently took a star turn as Sheriff Hunt in the Wild West horror movie Bone Tomahawk (2015).
In the Tarantino film, Russell is the shaggy-haired, gun-wielding, quick-tempered John Ruth, a man determined to take Leigh in for the $10,000 bounty. She plays a murdering member of an outlaw gang and Russell’s Ruth is handcuffed to her for most of The Hateful Eight.
He remains so even after a gunfight breaks out inside Minnie’s Haberdashery, the place where the eight hombres from the film’s title and others gather for a showdown.
When Russell shows up for The Hateful Eight press conference in Hollywood, publicists have him seated on the opposite side to how he was cuffed to her during the long weeks of the winter movie shoot in Colorado. Both Russell and Leigh get fidgety: “This is probably the first time we’ve ever sat like this,” Leigh says with a mischievous grin.
“We were starting to go with it,” Russell says with a cowboy snarl, “but I say bulls---, let’s change it!” So the two swap places on the podium and Russell recounts some of his experience in the Hateful shoot.
“I spent 41/2 months chained to Jennifer, (although) it felt very strange when people started dropping like flies!”
Staying chained to her throughout, Russell says, “just felt very weird, aside from the fact that I had a really good ticket, a front-row seat to watch all these guys …”
Russell went out of his way to say he’s impressed by some of Tarantino’s repertory group, including Hateful co-stars Samuel L. Jackson, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern and scene-stealer Walton Goggins.
As for Leigh, she was just as impressed with Russell, who showed up for scenes with her even when he had no lines and little to do.