Tarantino recounts firing and rehiring Laurent for Basterds

Quentin Tarantino says he initially fired Mélanie Laurent from Inglourious Basterds after disliking her table read, then restored her to the lead role after she asked for another chance and completed rehearsals. In a new book about the 2009 film, he also recounts casting Isabelle Huppert as Madame Ada Mimieux before ending the arrangement amid contract discussions and her absence from the table read.

Tarantino’s account appears in Jay Glennie’s The Making of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds. The director said Laurent’s first reading was poor and that he dismissed her, but she later told him she had been unwell. Laurent persisted in seeking the part, saying she would travel to Germany and wait to see him.

Tarantino agreed to restart the process and said he would make a final decision after three days of rehearsals. Laurent ultimately played Shosanna Dreyfus, the French cinema owner at the center of the film’s story. Tarantino said he loved Laurent and praised her work in the finished film.

His account of Huppert’s casting differed in outcome. Tarantino said she had been cast as Madame Ada Mimieux, a woman who shelters Shosanna in Paris, but contract discussions stalled and...