Tarantino reveals he fired Mélanie Laurent from ‘Inglourious Basterds’ after disastrous table read

Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino has revealed that actor Mélanie Laurent was briefly fired from his 2009 film ‘Inglourious Basterds’ after he was disappointed with her performance during the cast's initial table read. Laurent, however, was determined to retain the role of Shosanna Dreyfus and eventually convinced the director to give her another opportunity.

The behind-the-scenes episode features in Jay Glennie's new book, ‘The Making of Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds’, released on November 10, 2026. In the book, Tarantino described the table read as one of the most important stages of his pre-production process, explaining that it was the first time he could experience the screenplay being performed by the entire cast.

“Mélanie Laurent's table read was terrible. It wasn't good enough to be terrible,” he recalled.

“The most exciting day of preproduction is for me the table read. That is the closest I get to seeing the movie for the first time. Up until then, it's just been me reading all the scenes to myself or to a friend... so a table read with the whole cast is so exciting and so important to me. Well, Mélanie was terrible, so I fired her,” Tarantino said.

How Laurent won her role back

Laurent, who played Shosanna Dreyfus, did not accept the decision quietly. She personally contacted Tarantino and explained that she had not been feeling well during the table read. She also offered to travel to Germany and stay at a hotel at her own expense until the filmmaker agreed to see her again.

Tarantino agreed to reconsider his decision, but made it conditional on Laurent completing three days of rehearsals before he decided whether she was suitable for the role.

The rehearsals eventually changed his mind, and Laurent was reinstated as Shosanna. Her performance went on to receive critical acclaim.

Tarantino made it clear that he had no lingering reservations about the actor, saying, “Let me just go on the record for everybody to know: I love Mélanie.”

He added that he had largely put the incident behind him because Laurent had ultimately become his definitive choice for the character.

“The fact of the matter is, if we were not talking about the making of ‘Inglourious Basterds’, I would never think about the table read again for the simple reason Mélanie is my Shosanna. She did a wonderful job,” he said.

Isabelle Huppert was also fired from the film

Tarantino also recalled another casting change involving French actor Isabelle Huppert, who had initially been cast as Madame Ada Mimieux. Contractual difficulties delayed the process, and Huppert did not attend the film's table read.

The filmmaker said the continued delays and her absence from the reading led him to dismiss her from the project. Her role was subsequently offered to Maggie Cheung, known for her performance in ‘In the Mood for Love’.

“She didn't show up, so....I fired her. I mean, I love Isabelle Huppert, 'Heaven's Gate' and all that, but there were issues with her contract. It just kept stalling. And then not coming to the table read. Well, we cast Maggie Cheung instead,” Tarantino said.

He was particularly firm about the importance of actors attending table reads, arguing that being cast did not guarantee that an actor would retain the role if they failed to turn up.

“As far as I'm concerned, if you're cast and you are not at that table, I don't owe you jack shit! You can be fired, especially if I get excited by what somebody else did in your absence,” he said.

Cheung eventually filmed scenes as Madame Ada Mimieux, but they were removed from the final cut. Tarantino explained that the character's storyline was unnecessary to the film's narrative because audiences did not need a detailed explanation of how Shosanna acquired the cinema. A title card reading ‘Four Years Later’, followed by Shosanna explaining that she had inherited it from her aunt, was sufficient, he said.

About ‘Inglourious Basterds’

Released in 2009, ‘Inglourious Basterds’ is an alternate-history World War II drama set in Nazi-occupied France. The film follows two parallel plots involving attempts to assassinate the top leadership of the Third Reich in Paris.

Laurent plays Shosanna Dreyfus, the sole survivor of a Jewish family in rural France murdered by Colonel Hans Landa, played by Christoph Waltz. Shosanna later runs a cinema in Paris and plans her revenge against the Nazis.

The film also stars Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbender and Diane Kruger, alongside Waltz and Laurent. It premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, where Waltz won the Best Actor award. He subsequently received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of Landa.

The new book by Jay Glennie offers an extensive account of the film's production, covering its screenplay, casting, rehearsals, production design and costumes. It features a foreword by Brad Pitt and an introduction by Tarantino.