Think about you’re again in 2011, deep in Hollywood rumorville. Quentin Tarantino has simply completed writing his bloody, twisted love letter to spaghetti westerns, Django Unchained. It’s obtained bounty hunters, slave merchants, revenge, gunfights, and sufficient buckets of blood to make Sam Peckinpah blush. However right here’s the kicker: for a scorching minute, the man Tarantino wished entrance and heart as Django wasn’t Jamie Foxx. He wished none aside from Will Smith, The Contemporary Prince who danced with Carlton, saved the world from aliens twice, rapped about Summertime, and have become the largest film star on Earth. Now think about him driving throughout the display screen, decked out in cowboy gear, spitting one-liners between headshots…this was nearly a risk. However it didn’t. And the the reason why are fascinating. In reality, they could inform us extra about Will Smith; the artist, the model, the household man, than they do about Tarantino or Django. So leaping again to actuality, we’re asking: What if Will Smith performed the titular position of Django in Django Unchained? What motion pictures would he not have carried out? How would Tarantino’s bloody fairy story have modified? And perhaps the largest query of all: why did Smith go on one of the daring movies of the final decade?
When Django Unchained was first introduced, Tarantino’s script began making the rounds in Hollywood in 2011. The thrill was speedy. Right here was Quentin mixing exploitation cinema with revisionist western tropes to sort out America’s ugliest chapter, slavery, by means of the eyes of a freed man on a mission. Casting Django was going to be every little thing…however who would he choose?
Tarantino checked out a handful of actors. Michael Okay. Williams was thought of, Idris Elba’s title floated round, after which Large Willie Fashion was in severe talks. He was the primary selection. Let’s take a refresher and look again to Smith’s profession as much as 2011. Simply a few years earlier than, he starred in I Am Legend and Hancock. These have been two instances when Smith may nonetheless mainly print cash on the field workplace. Placing him in a Tarantino movie would’ve been a large cultural second, and may need introduced in additional income to be Quentin’s most worthwhile field workplace achievement.
Nicely, that summer season the tide had shifted. Jamie Foxx emerged because the frontrunner, and finally nabbed the position. The remaining is historical past. Or at the least, the model of historical past on this universe. However Smith wasn’t simply handed over, he willingly selected to stroll away. Which brings us to the ten million-dollar query: why? Will has been requested through the years why he turned down Django, and his solutions peel again layers of who he was as a star at that second.
Right here’s the primary purpose. Smith didn’t suppose Django was the true lead. At a roundtable with The Hollywood Reporter, Smith admitted: “I wanted to do Django, but I thought it was more about Schultz than Django. I needed to be the lead character.” That Schultz, in fact, was Christoph Waltz’s German bounty hunter, who finally ends up killing the movie’s important villain, Calvin Candie. Smith even pushed Tarantino, saying, “No, Quentin, please, I need to kill the bad guy!” Tarantino stated no. Smith walked. He later known as the screenplay genius however admitted, “It just wasn’t for me.”
So what’s the second purpose? Nicely, Smith wished the film to be a love story and never a revenge story. He stated he didn’t envision Django as a gun-toting avenger however as a person pushed purely by love for his spouse. In his phrases: “Violence begets violence. For me, the greatest display of love in the history of cinema had to be Django.” In different phrases, he wished to show Tarantino’s operatic revenge western right into a sweeping love epic. Which, if you already know Tarantino, was by no means gonna occur.
Third purpose? The toll it’d’ve taken on him and his household. In later interviews, Smith revealed he had a type of household assembly in regards to the position. His children, in addition to his personal instincts,instructed him the darkness of slavery, revenge, and trauma would possibly bleed into his residence life. He was cautious of enjoying a personality that was brutal. He even admitted that earlier in his profession he prevented slave roles as a result of he didn’t wish to perpetuate damaging depictions of Black folks. However but, a decade later, he lastly took on Emancipation, a movie about slavery that he stated was “emotionally and spiritually devastating” to make. It’s a movie that didn’t bode over in addition to Django and actually didn’t keep within the tradition zeitgeist as effectively both. It’s as if Django haunted him for years.
So between not killing the villain, wanting a love story, and never wanting to pull that ache residence, Will Smith selected to say no.
Alright, able to play some film-nerd fantasy reserving: what if Will Smith HAD performed Django? First off, the tone of the film would’ve been fully totally different. Jamie Foxx performed Django with this cool, quiet depth. He’s stoic, lethal, and slips into Tarantino’s heightened violence like a glove. Will is a performer who thrives on allure and charisma. It’s not that he can’t go darkish, he’s placed on wonderful dramatic performances like Ali or Pursuit of Happyness. However placing him in Tarantino’s blood-splattered playground, and you already know the vitality shifts. All of a sudden, Django is perhaps cracking extra one-liners, dropping extra bravado into the combination. Possibly a bit extra “Wild Wild West” swagger, and rather less Leone-inspired stoicism. We’re not saying its precisely how he would act, however we’re betting alongside these strains.
Let’s discuss in regards to the story. What if Smith had his means and Django kills Candie. That adjustments the entire climax. Tarantino’s model is all about Schultz pulling the set off, which value him his life, and leaves Django to mop up the aftermath. If Django kills Candie himself, that catharsis shifts. It turns into a special movie, much less a couple of partnership and sacrifice, and extra about straight-up vengeance. Tarantino, although, was married to his model. Which suggests if Smith had been solid, perhaps he and Quentin would’ve clashed nonstop. Possibly the movie we all know doesn’t even exist in its present type, an concept us followers can’t fathom.
Additionally, what in regards to the casting ripple results? Would Christoph Waltz nonetheless have been in it? Would Tarantino have doubled down on Leo as Candie if Smith was anchoring the opposite aspect? Possibly. However it’s additionally potential the chemistry we obtained, Foxx’s quiet resolve enjoying towards Waltz’s vitality, wouldn’t have labored the identical. And let’s be sincere, Tarantino and Smith collectively? That’s like mixing oil and vinegar. They’re each too alpha to offer floor. Suppose two Christian Bales on Terminator: Salvation set. However the crew would have been asking themselves who’s directing who?
If Will Smith was the star of Django, his complete profession trajectory may’ve shifted.
Let’s not overlook what he did as a substitute. Round that very same time, he starred in Males in Black 3, which was a significantly better sequel than the earlier one earlier than it. Later, he did After Earth with Jaden, which was a crucial catastrophe and one other L for M. Night time Shyamalan. If Django had been his 2012 film as a substitute of MIB 3, immediately Smith is again within the awards dialog. However to be truthful, he may have had each. Smith began filming MIB in 2010 and went again for reshoots in 2011. As a result of these are each Sony Footage properties, the studio may have labored out a deal for Will to have his cake and eat it too. Hell, perhaps he received an Oscar years earlier, perhaps MIB 3 would have been the hit of the summer season over The Avengers, which was an enormous gamble on the time. Possibly he by no means does After Earth. Possibly he doesn’t spend the 2010s struggling to seek out one other defining position.
And what would have occurred to Jamie Foxx? Shedding Django may’ve been a large setback. It revitalized his profession and gave him one in all his defining performances, apart from Mom F**ker Jones in Horrible Bosses the 12 months earlier than. With out it, who is aware of and that is all hypothesis. It’s potential Jamie wouldn’t have headlined Child Driver or been bestowed the position of Electro in The Superb Spider-Man 2.
Field office-wise, Django made $426 million with out Smith. With him, it most likely would have made extra. However would it not nonetheless have the identical chew? Or would audiences have felt like they have been watching “Will Smith does Tarantino” as a substitute of Tarantino at his rawest?
On the finish of the day, Will Smith passing on Django Unchained is a type of huge Hollywood “what ifs” that makes you cease and surprise. He had the star energy, the charisma, the attain to take Tarantino’s movie into a special stratosphere. However the inventive conflict was too huge. Smith wished love whereas Tarantino wished blood. And people two visions simply couldn’t dwell in the identical film.
What we obtained as a substitute was a brutal, trendy, and unforgettable revenge western that cemented Jamie Foxx in movie historical past and gave us one in all Tarantino’s highest-grossing movies ever. What we didn’t get was the Will Smith model, a “love story” that most likely would’ve been greater on the field workplace, softer within the edges, and perhaps not as sharp in its chew.
Nonetheless, it’s fascinating to consider. Will Smith as Django would’ve modified the movie, modified his profession, perhaps even modified the course of Tarantino’s later work. However typically the roles you don’t take are simply as defining as those you do. For Smith, Django was the highway not taken which was a selection that claims as a lot about his priorities because it does in regards to the movie itself. And he’s not alone in that. Tarantino truly wrote the position of Donny “The Bear Jew” in Inglourious Basterds for Adam Sandler, however scheduling conflicts meant Sandler by no means picked up the bat, leaving Eli Roth to step in. Identical to Smith, Sandler’s absence reshaped the movie in methods which can be not possible to disregard. It’s a reminder that in Tarantino’s world, casting “what ifs” are nearly as legendary as the films themselves.
And hey, perhaps that’s the lesson. Each Hollywood “what if” leaves behind two tales: the one we noticed, and the one that may’ve been. And on this case, the Django that wasn’t is sort of as compelling because the Django that was.
