Quentin Tarantino went on Bret Easton Ellis’ podcast two weeks ago to give his top 20 films of the 21st century and ended up punching down at Paul Dano, Matthew Lillard, and Owen Wilson. While neither Dano nhor Wilson have yet publicly acknowledged the comments, Lillard admitted at an Ohio GalaxyCon that being called out like that out of the blue “f-cking sucks” and “hurts your feelings.” A lot of people in the industry have risen to Dano’s defense, including Daniel Day-Lewis, Toni Collette, and Ethan Hawke. Lillard also has big names in his corner including James Gunn, Mike Flanagan, Rahul Kohli, Kate Siegel and now Ryan Reynolds. Lillard just released a commercial for Mint Mobile, the cell phone carrier that Reynolds used to part-own, but now just advertises for. Reynolds narrates the spot while Lillard pokes fun at himself by alluding to Tarantino’s comments.
In a recent commercial for Mint Mobile, a company Reynolds used to be a shareholder in but now is a marketing spokesperson for, Lillard is referred to as one of two things people “universally” love.
Lillard then jokingly notes that the love for him is “not unanimous,” to which Reynolds’ voiceover then crosses him off the list. When Lillard asks why he’s there, Reynolds says that he’s not a fan of Lillard’s attitude, jokingly putting an affectation on his last name.
The new ad, which features the two stars who actually appeared together in the 2001 movie Finder’s Fee, comes after Tarantino had some less-than-kind things to say about Lillard. In a talk on The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast, Tarantino said he was not a fan of Paul Dano, and also name dropped both Owen Wilson and Lillard as actors he didn’t like.
“I don’t care for [Paul Dano], I don’t care for Owen Wilson, and I don’t care for Matthew Lillard,” Quentin said.
This was a great clapback. It was short, sweet, and made its point in a funny way. Beyond that, it reminded people of Lillard’s most mainstream role as Shaggy in Scooby Doo and also showed that he has powerful “newer” Hollywood alleys like Ryan Reynolds in his corner. I had no idea that the two of them were in a movie together in 2001. That was when Lillard was a bigger star than Reynolds was, too.
The industry’s reaction to Tarantino’s comments has been so interesting. Zach Woods (Gabe from The Office and Jared from Silicon Valley) was among those who spoke out against Tarantino. First, he came to Dano’s defense, then he doubled down. I thought it was interesting how many known, but non-A-list actors commented on his post. I understand why DDL, Collette, and Hawke spoke out, but they’re all A-list and don’t “need” to kiss a famous director’s ass. QT will be absolutely fine, but I think he went on Ellison’s podcast thinking that he was hot sh-t, so he ran his mouth, believing that he could say no wrong. Instead, he learned the hard way that while a lot of his colleagues may respect his work, he’s not as teflon as he thought.
Photos credit: Sadou Faye/Avalon, Jeffrey Mayer/Avalon, Kay Qiao/Image Press Agency/Avalon