Who is Quentin Tarantino's mother? Director had vowed never to share 'penny' with harsh parent
In a new interview with 'Billions' creator Brian Koppelman, film maestro Quentin Tarantino has shed light on the strained relationship with his mother. Alleging she was discouraging of his knack for writing ever since grade school, Tarantino revealed how he had vowed as a child to never share a "penny" with his mother in the future.
Tarantino, who is known for his vast spate of cinematic masterpieces like 'Pulp Fiction', 'Kill Bill', 'Inglourious Basterds', and more recently 'Once Upo a Time in Hollywood', told podcast host Koppelman that he is a fan of his Showtime drama too. Tarantino shared how he had discovered 'Billions' in Israel after moving there with his Israeli wife Daniella for three months at first, and then much longer as the pandemic broke out. Personally a fan of films like 'The Social Network', Tarantino often draws Internet flak for his odd, non-conventional tastes. But this latest revelation about his mother's parenting makes one wonder who she is and what led to such harsh criticism towards her own son.
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Who is Quentin Tarantino's mother?
Identified as Connie Zastoupil, Tarantino's mother was reportedly 16 years old when she gave birth to the future movie auteur in Tenessee. When Tarantino was 4, Connie moved to LA with her toddler, and by the time the boy was in grade school, his flair for writing showed up. Tarantino alleged in the interview that school authorities didn't take very kindly to him indulging in writing scripts as opposed to doing his classwork - something that eventually reached his mother and she expressed she was fed up with his interests.
Revealing that teachers at school “looked at (writing scripts) as a defiant act of rebellion that I’m doing this instead of my school work," Tarantino claimed he had already written a script called 'Captain Peachfuzz and the Anchovy Bandit' at the age of just 12. But with him struggling at school, Tarantino told Koppelman: "my mom always had a hard time about my scholastic non-ability.” When he got into trouble for writing screenplays in school, his mom was allegedly "was bitching at me… about that…. and then in the middle of her little tirade, she said, ‘Oh, and by the way, this little ‘writing career,’ with the finger quotes and everything. This little ‘writing career’ that you’re doing? That s–t is over!'”
Tarantino added: “And when she said that to me in that sarcastic way, I was in my head, and I go, ‘OK, lady. When I become a successful writer, you will never see penny one from my success. There will be no house for you. There’s no vacation for you, no Elvis Cadillac for mommy. You get nothing. Because you said that.” The director has self-admittedly kept his vow as he answered Koppelman in the affirmative when asked if he stuck to the promise. "I helped her out with a jam with the IRS. But no house. No Cadillac, no house," Tarantino told him.
Tarantino's strained relationship with mother
According to the director, Conni is still alive but he had long ago cut her off financially. "There are consequences for your words as you deal with your children, remember there are consequences for your sarcastic tone about what’s meaningful to them," he told Koppelman about the parenting he endured as child. According to The New Yorker, there was an "Agee-esque legend that had grown up around Tarantino since the release of ‘Reservoir Dogs’: that he was a dirt-poor illiterate hillbilly from Tennessee, brought up by a teen-age dropout.”
When Connie once spoke to Jami Bernard, the author of 'Quentin Tarantino: The Man and His Movies', she alleged "Quentin would have you believe he was raised by wolves.” The New Yorker however asserted in the 2003 piece: “It’s true that she was born in Tennessee and had Quentin when she was sixteen, but he was an accident. She got married in order to become an emancipated minor and go to college; she was, therefore, furious to discover that she was pregnant after her husband, Tony Tarantino, had assured her that he was sterile. She was angry enough to divorce him, and she didn’t introduce him to his son until Quentin was a few years old.”