“Pulp Fiction” — An Oral History

As ill-fated coffee shop burglar Pumpkin in Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction,” Tim Roth knows the truth about a privileged piece of movie mythology.

“We tend to know only as much as [our character] would know, but one thing that I do know because my character would know, which is what’s in the suitcase,” Roth reveals. “But Quentin asked me not to mention it.”

In a film full of mysteries, the contents of that sacred object remain among the biggest. But even without Jules Winnfield’s 9mm pistol pointed at his head, Roth is kind enough to volunteer an answer that, though perhaps slightly disappointing, is at least factually accurate. “I remember him saying that the answer if they ask you was, ‘A battery and a lamp’.”

To commemorate the 30^th anniversary of “Pulp Fiction,” Variety spoke with more than 20 members of the film’s cast and crew about their experiences, recollections and insights. This article is actually the second part of our larger retrospective; while this chronicles the production itself, the other piece traces the project from its origins to its eventual legacy as one of the most successful and influential independent films ever made.

David Wasco, production designer: We knew that there was more money for “Pulp,” but it was still a modestly budgeted indie film.

Sandy Wasco, set decorator: We felt free to bring in different genres, so we mixed in different architectural styles to separate the stories. So we had the mid-century Hawthorne Grill, and then Jack Rabbit Slim’s, the craftsman bungalow for the Jodie and Eric Stoltz’s character. We had the Polynesian post-war family room for the watch sequence.

Although Tim Roth remembers Tarantino originally writing the role of fugitive boxer Butch for him to play, the filmmaker would eventually cast his former “Reservoir Dogs” star in a small but pivotal role in the film’s wraparound scene in the diner.

Tim Roth (“Pumpkin”): My feeling is he’d just gotten more finances, but the guy was exactly the same. He’d probably gotten a nicer car. Actually, no, he kept his car. It was always full of cups and food wrappers.

Travolta (“Vincent Vega”): I think the first scene we worked on was grabbing the guns out of the trunk of the car and entering from outside of the building where we shot the college kids.

Samuel L. Jackson (“Jules Winnfield”): We rehearsed the scene where John and I are walking up to the apartment to retrieve the briefcase from Marvin and his friends for quite a while.  We even had the number of steps counted off from the trunk to the door, so we could really get our beats down and wrap our minds around that long talky scene about Tony Rocky Horror and Foot Massages.  That process was a lot of fun for all of us.

Travolta: I did not know Sam before, but sometimes you just have a natural chemistry with another actor. We were just very comfortable with each other and Sam was the ultimate professional. And in the Quentin environment, it was very easy to do your job.

Before casting “Pulp Fiction,” Tarantino had participated in an improv show at the Groundlings Theatre after meeting Julia Sweeney (now Julia Sweeney Blum) on “Saturday Night Live.” He would eventually cast five Groundlings in the film: Sweeney, Phil LaMarr, Karen Maruyama, Steve Hibbert, and Kathy Griffin. He tapped other actors for roles after making connections during the development of “Reservoir Dogs.”

Frank Whaley (“Brett”): I had met Quentin when I went in and read for “Reservoir Dogs” and obviously didn’t get the part. But of off that, he and I knew each other for a little bit. And then they brought me in to read for [Lance,] the part that Eric Stoltz played. And then I got a call saying, “You didn’t get that part, but he wants you to play this other part.”

Betsy Heimann, costume designer: There were no costume descriptions. It was just the script, the character, the conversation, the dialogue. On “Pulp,” I said, “I think Jules and Vincent are Reservoir Dogs.” This is a continuation of Vic Vega, Michael Madsen in “Reservoir Dogs.” And Vincent was his brother, so they were both Dogs.

David Wasco: The dope bust apartment was a set, but the practical apartment building that John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson walked through the hallways was a practical location that is no longer there. It fell down in the ’94 earthquake. But that room was a set, and that was basically in the same big warehouse that we created Jack Rabbit Slim’s. We also built the elevator that they ride up in the lobby.

How well defined were the college kids’ back stories?

Phil LaMarr (“Marvin”): Frank [Whaley] and the rest of us did not sit down and come up with a backstory about, “Were we college guys who decided to get into stealing stuff?” But Quentin and I did talk about Marvin and it was like we feel like Jules discovered some connection with somebody who knew Marvin and he was able work this out. And I was thinking, “maybe my auntie is his vegetarian girlfriend.”

Whaley: I think that might’ve been one of the first times I had been shot, so to speak, and working with the squibs and all that stuff. And he wanted everything very realistic looking. It’s an action scene, essentially. But it was scary definitely, having six or seven high energy squib packs taped to your chest.

Travolta: Quentin sets an atmosphere where you are free to create your role without inhibitions, and he gives you lots of opportunities to explore. It’s a very calm and nurturing arena and if something needs to be directed in another way, he will gently guide you there. Mostly, he instills confidence.

According to producer Lawrence Bender, Mia Wallace was the one role in which Tarantino hadn’t already pictured an actor. The shaggy process of selecting Uma Thurman lent a freedom to her co-star Ving Rhames as he developed the resolute, intimidating presence of her onscreen husband Marsellus.

Bender: For Mia Wallace,it was the one role he couldn’t picture who this person was. And at first he didn’t even think [Uma] was the right person for the role. And Uma’s agent called Quentin’s manager and said, “we set up this meeting for Quentin and Uma.” Quentin didn’t want to be rude, so he went to meet with her alone. And he came out of that meeting and I could see in his eyes, he found his Mia. It’s hard to say what it is exactly that made her Mia, but there was something about her that he got it.

Ving  (“Marsellus Wallace”): [Quentin] allowed me to make my own choices. We had some rehearsals, and I played who I thought the character was: a king and a gangster.

To create retro eatery Jack Rabbit Slim’s for the date between Vincent and Mia, Wasco lucked into a location for the exterior that he matched with a set built in the back of the film’s production offices.

David Wasco: The exterior of Jack Rabbit’s was a mid-century googie-style bowling alley that Miramax had just purchased by Disney and they said, “Oh, you can have this location for free. We’re going to demolish this.” We basically rimmed the place with neon and did the big sign, and then Quentin put motorcycle riders and everything. [For the interior,] he did reference two movies: One was Howard Hawks’ “Red Line 7000,” and the other was Elvis Presley’s “Speedway.” In both of those movies there was a bar where the patrons would sit in automobiles that were cut in half and they became bankheads.

Unsurprisingly, Tarantino supplied film references to many cast and crew members to inspire their scenes, including pedigreed rug-cutter Travolta for the dance contest sequence.

Travolta: Dancing is always exciting, and never intimidating to me. The dance steps were a blast to work out because he allowed me to contribute some of my novelty dances that I grew up with — beyond the twist, I added the swim and the Batman and some other steps that were improvised. But Quentin definitely set the style in which they were to be done, which was very reflective of the Godard movie [“Bande à part,” also the name of Tarantino’s production company at the time] that he had us watch. 

For Mia’s date look, Heimann drew from a “Tarantinoverse” inspiration that was hidden in plain sight.

Heimann: I wanted her to show Vincent that she was a Reservoir Dog just like him. And what would show that? White shirt, black pants, black jacket, and then she had the little bandeau underneath. That was a handkerchief pattern because there was this whole cowboy, cowgirl undertone to the whole thing. I would never think to have him rip her shirt off and have her just in a bra. I wanted it to be like, “What’s underneath here?” She’s a cowgirl!

David Wasco: When we were building Jack Rabbit Slim’s, Quentin hosted the then unknown Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson on the set. They came and visited, so we walked around and showed them. And Wes was like 21 or something. And we were just ready to part, and he said, “I have this script. Do you mind if I get this to you?” And I said, “Sure.” And that was “Bottle Rocket,” which we then ended up doing.

Eric Stoltz (“Lance”): Quentin handed me the script and said, “take a look at the two guys who wear robes and let me know which one you’d like to play.”  That’s a rare and wonderful way to offer an actor something.

Betsy Heimann: While researching “Reservoir Dogs,” we watched a lot of “Speed Racer.” When we did “Pulp Fiction,” I said, “I’m thinking this Eric Stoltz character never leaves the house, so I wonder if we can get a ‘Speed Racer’ T-shirt.” And [Quentin] just laughed and pulled one out of the closet — Eric’s wearing his.

Rosanna Arquette (“Jody”): She was pierced on the page. I did pierce my nose for it, but that’s the only place. I feel like Jody definitely got off on the idea of [the needle into Mia’s chest being] the ultimate piercing. I kind of discovered that in the moment this was kind of getting her off.

David Wasco: One thing that was Sandy’s idea was in Lance’s bedroom, there are these little pedestals that come off the wall with platform high-heeled shoes on them. I cannot tell you in the 30 plus years since we did the movie, that’s the one thing that people bring up the most. It’s the stupid shoes.

Arquette: We were in a cramped, stuffy, little house, and it was real, so you felt like they lived in this messy place. He’s eating cereal. She collects her shoes. When you’re put in an environment that feels so real for the scene that you’re about to do, it just enhances everything to a great space.

Heimann: They had a friend [“Trudi,” played by Bronagh Gallagher] that was there when they brought Mia in, and she was lovely. And she had said to me, “My boyfriend’s in a band, and would it be okay if I wore the T-shirt?” And I said, “I’d love you to wear the T-shirt.” And then they lost her luggage. And I just put her in a black T-shirt. I felt so bad.

Stoltz: John didn’t actually drive his car into the house. You’ll notice the camera is inside — Quentin was actually the operator — and we see the car zipping by with the stunt doubles in it. When that car leaves the frame, I walk up to the glass front door. The glass door was supposed to shatter, but they could never get it to happen, so I just kind of jumped a little like on the old “Star Trek” episodes, and then when I walk outside, John and Uma were there in a matching pre-set car, placed as though they’d driven into the house.

David Wasco: This pristine Chevy that Travolta drives, we only had one, I believe, and we couldn’t crash the car into the house. So the art department had to build, extend, and do a completely knocked-down porch where if a car had run into it at 60 miles an hour, and then we had to take this pristine classic Chevy and make it look like it’s damaged. The car jumps the curb, and Lance runs out, and the car’s already just nosed into the crash part of that.

Everyone involved indicated that the needle scene was as emotionally charged in the room as it ends up on screen.

Travolta: Creating the collective energy that together would cause you to believe it included actions and dialogue that had to be timed because it was such a unique scene.

Stoltz: Quentin directed it like a master conductor — we were all as prepped and excited as possible.

Arquette: We were feeling it in that room, and that’s because we were really prepared. Once you’re in your place, you know where the camera’s going to be this way, so you don’t have to do anything except do the work and let it flow.

After Vincent and Mia’s disastrous date, Christopher Walken’s flashback monologue as Captain Koons, gifting a watch to future boxer Butch, offered both a moment to rest, as well as a showcase for the florid and profane dialogue that came to be synonymous with Tarantino.

Sandy Wasco, set decorator: The Gold Watch set could have just been a ’50s house. But it does speak to bases on Hawaii or the Philippines, and it has that little bit of something that makes it different.

Christopher Walken (“Captain Koons”): The scene that I did with the little boy was on the last day of shooting — everybody had finished and gone home. And we shot in a real house in some neighborhood around Los Angeles, and there was the mother and the little boy and Quentin with a very small crew. We got there in the morning and shot it, and I think we were done by lunchtime.

Walken: It was eight pages of dialogue — it was monologue, really — and I’d had it for months. I would spend some time with it every day, and every time I got to the thing at the end of handing the kid the watch, it made me laugh. Really, every time for months. I went in and shot the scene quickly in a few hours, and I remember the little boy was there and they shot him, but after a couple of hours he got sleepy. So I did the rest of the shots just looking into the lens.

Parts of “The Gold Watch” came from “Pandemonium Reigns,” the short film Roger Avary had written when the film was conceived as an anthology. Tarantino and Avary reimagined it for “Pulp Fiction,” and then merged it with another idea Tarantino got from a short film, “Curdled,” he’d seen at a film festival in Italy.

Roger Avary, cowriter, story: The general idea going in was let’s take a staple of noir — the boxer who throws the fight, for example — and then let’s turn left instead. I was writing for Matt Dillon originally.

Angela Jones (“Esmerelda Villalobos”): I was in graduate school at Florida State University getting my degree when we did “Curdled.” Quentin saw the short and loved it, and talked to our producer and said he was thinking he wanted to do something with that character. I moved out to Los Angeles a few months later, and Quentin called me to do what I did in “Curdled.”

Opposite Bruce Willis’ Butch, then-newcomer Jones played Esmerelda, a cab driver obsessed with death. The sequence was shot in a static cab while the driving environment was created with rear projection.

David Wasco: Well, for all the poor man’s process driving around, Quentin and I went to this archive on Melrose of background projection captures from day one in making movies — we’re talking very, very, very old. And he picked a lot of black and white stuff and then some color stuff. That became what you’re looking out at when Bruce Willis is driving in the back of the cab.

Jones: We had one day of rehearsal, and what I realized was I couldn’t see Bruce behind me, so it was hard to act. This was my first movie and I was so nervous, and then Quentin was in front of the cab, telling me when to stop and moving the cab up and down. But Bruce, when he got there, he was amazing.

A shot of Esmerelda stepping on the gas would offer audience their first glimpse of a subject for which Tarantino has subsequently demonstrated a repeated appreciation: women’s feet.

Jones: In the script I believe it said that she was driving barefoot, though in the short that I did, I was barefoot in the blood. But when we came to shoot it, we were running out of time and Lawrence said we don’t have time for the shot of me hitting the gas pedal. There was a back and forth and then all of a sudden, we were back on and we got the shot.

Heimann: I said, “I really think [Butch’s jacket] should be like Nick Nolte’s in ‘Hanover Street’.” And he said, “No, no, the leather jacket from ‘Who Will Stop the Rain’.” This was our language of communication. We were both thinking about the same thing, but in a different movie, and then what we came up with in the end was a third idea, born of the other two.

Avary credits Tarantino for created the most romantic moment between Butch and Fabienne (Maria de Madeiros), his mousy girlfriend.

Avary: Quentin added the scene when she talks about her pot belly. It’s one of my favorite lines. But the difficulty in pulling that scene off is that the sweet French girl is actually an annoying character. He’s just been through hell, and she’s like, “they didn’t have blueberries for my pancakes.” Her problems are so small, but they’re the most important problems he has to deal with. And it’s so romantic and so funny, and to pull that off she has to be vulnerable and extremely feminine, but also sweet — you have to love her enough to allow her to whine a little.

Although many locations from the film no longer exist, Wasco notes that one not only still stands but  looks virtually the same today.

David Wasco: What’s interestingly unchanged is the Bruce Willis-hitting-Ving Rhames-at-the-Tasty Freeze intersection. It’s [near Lance and Jody’s house] in Atwater Village.

Kathy Griffin (“Kathy Griffin”): I remember I had to do his dialogue letter perfect. I was grateful I remembered my three fucking lines. Originally, I auditioned for the role that Rosanna Arquette got because she’s a better actress. [Quentin and I] were sort of dating, so I tried to use the casting couch on him. But the truth is, while he stayed overnight at my apartment, we just cuddled, and we didn’t do the deed.

Like with the Jack Rabbit Slim’s exterior and interior, Wasco says he merged two locations — one real and the other a set — for the setting for one of the film’s most shocking scenes.

David Wasco: The pawn shop basement was also a set. The upstairs was an actual pawn shop that we enhanced in either Van Nuys or North Hollywood, but there are no basements in the valley, so we created this space that seamlessly melded into the movie and you buy the whole thing.

Depending on what role the actors played, capturing the intensity of the basement scene required fearlessness or restraint.

Rhames: In moment-to-moment reality, [Bruce and I] played off of each other.

Duane Whitaker (“Maynard”): In someone else’s hands, those sequences could have been really awful, because it’s a matter of the tone. And when I came in to read for it, I was doing “Deliverance.” I tore the room apart. And [Quentin] said, “I want Orange County Sheriff — just real calm, all business.” And we did the scene, and it makes it ten times scarier, because obviously they’ve done it before and they’re kind of relaxed with the whole thing.

Rhames: Quentin brought up the contents of the scene the day of and asked me if I was ok to do it. I had no [trepidations], because I am not gay and comfortable with my masculinity. 

Whitaker: I learned a lot watching Bruce Willis work during the sequence where he’s holding the sword on Peter Greene and he’s like, “Go pick up the gun.” The scene came up and he just sits there and kind of smiled and whispered, and I thought, there’s a reason this guy’s a movie star. Every idea he had was great. He was off camera, and he had that ball gag on, and he was giving 100%.

Some of the restraint ended up being imposed externally: Tarantino originally considered using The Knack’s “My Sharona” for the sequence, instead of The Revels’ “Comanche.”

Rachtman: I was also working on “Reality Bites,” and that was a tough one because I was very much involved in it. So we just let The Knack decide, and they wanted “Reality Bites.” It was an uncomfortable situation to be in. But “Pulp Fiction,” was fine without it. It’s so interesting, because Quentin is so brilliant in that way of [identifying], “Okay, you need to take a breath now, or you need to laugh now.” And the music would be like, “What the fuck?” I wish I could describe it better than that, but it was really fascinating, the brilliance of his song choices.

“The Bonnie Situation” flashes back to the final moments of the dope bust sequence, introducing the late Alexis Arquette as “Fourth Man,” who was hiding in the bathroom while Jules and Vincent terrorize — and murder — his friends.

Arquette: I’m proud to say Alexis is in this movie, and it’s the perfect moment that Alexis has, which is behind the door, during the big sermon, he’s there with the gun. He’s playing a boy at that point, and he brings a humor to it. Quentin gets that dark humor, which I love so much, and Alexis has that. I love that there’s this moment of terror, but he brings this humor to it.

As Marvin one of cinema’s most famous gunshot victims, LaMarr says that a few things changed in the creation of the sequence where his character meets his comically grisly end.

LaMarr: Originally, Marvin was supposed to get shot twice: once in the throat, and then they go, “Damn, we’ve got to put him out of his misery,” and then Vincent kills the kid. But John said, “If I kill this guy on purpose, the audience is going to hate me.” And so they changed it to just the one accidental shot. The other choice was that they built a bust of me that was rigged to shoot tons of brain and blood onto the back window, though Quentin never planned for that to be in the final cut. He said, “we’re going to show this young Black kid getting his brains blown out for the ratings people to give them some things that you can take out, so you can leave in some other things.” So if they hadn’t blown out my brains, they would’ve had to cut out the Gimp.

Sandy Wasco: Bonnie and Jimmy’s house was really tough to find. But it was just the perfect location because it was the most feminine thing in the whole movie, and it just made the whole situation completely absurd.

By the time the production calendar got to shooting the “Bonnie Situation” sequences, Tarantino encountered an unexpected problem: a scheduling conflict threatened to prevent him from using his “Reservoir Dogs” co-star and mentor, Harvey Keitel.

Bender: Harvey’s schedule on his other movie changed, and our schedule was not going to work. So I went to the crew and said, “The only way we can work this out is if we shoot on Sunday. Would you let me shoot on Sunday?” And they all said, “Yes, we want to support Harvey and support the movie,” and we made it work.

Julia Sweeney Blum: I met Quentin at an after party for “Saturday Night Live” and we started talking about Yasujiro Ozu, who’s my favorite director, for three hours. I knew I’d met a great friend. I had written a draft of [my “Saturday Night Live” spinoff film] “It’s Pat” and he had some ideas, and we did a quick rewrite together on that. And then he started writing “Pulp Fiction,” and he said later he had a part for me in it, and I was excited. I got there at 11:00, I was home at 4:00. I had just shot the “Pat” movie, which took two months in a frigging Pat outfit. It’s just funny how Hollywood goes — you do this thing that takes four or five hours, and you end up doing an interview with Variety about it 30 years later. And then you do something like the Pat movie that takes over your life for a year, and 17 people saw it.

After Tarantino cast Bender, his producer, in a small role in “Reservoir Dogs,” he offered him a choice of parts for his follow-up appearance in “Pulp Fiction.” He shows up in the diner sequence as a patron bullied by Roth’s Pumpkin.

Bender: Quentin was like, “we’ve got to put you in the movie, and as a credit, you have a choice. You could either be Long Hair Yuppie-Scum, or a Hollywood Type.” I said, “I’ll take the Long Hair Yuppie-Scum any day.”

In addition to “what’s in the briefcase?,” one element that’s been heavily speculated about in the 30 years since the film’s release is the reason, and meaning, of a few continuity flubs: bullet holes that appear behind Vincent and Jules before they’re shot at by Alexis Arquette’s Fourth Man, and a few changed words in the dialogue spoken by Amanda Plummer’s Honey Bunny as they rob the coffee shop. Leave it to Samuel L. Jackson to demystify that microscopic corner of the film’s lore.

Jackson: The actors didn’t have any awareness of those continuity differences while we were shooting. I think he included them because they were the best takes, but also because it fit the grindhouse film tone that I think Quentin had in mind for “Pulp Fiction.” Those movies had all sorts of continuity errors and jump cuts and hair in the gate and it added to the charm of them. So I just think he liked them aesthetically.