The Footwear

Uma Thurman has appeared in four Quentin Tarantino films. She has been nominated for a Golden Globe for one of them. She has worked with this director since 1994. She knows things.

When Maya Hawke — Uma's daughter — was preparing to work with Quentin Tarantino, Uma had advice. Thirty-two years of professional collaboration with one of the most technically specific directors in contemporary cinema, compressed into a single transmission, mother to daughter, before Maya walked onto the set.

Keep your shoes on.

This was the advice. Not: his blocking is very precise, so arrive early and understand the geography. Not: he will rewrite things on set, which I can confirm from personal experience. Not: the craft is extraordinary and the final product is worth it, which I can also confirm because I have seen the products. The advisory, in its entirety, was about maintaining contact between the foot and the shoe.

(Quentin Tarantino has, in every film he has directed, filmed feet with a frequency and intention that cannot be described as incidental. Pulp Fiction contains foot shots that could function as a separate short film. Kill Bill has boots. Kill Bill 2 has boots with different context. He has discussed his interest publicly. Several journalists have discussed it for him. His filmography is not ambiguous on the subject.)

Maya Hawke presumably kept her shoes on. She had been told to.

The question this raises — which I have not been able to stop thinking about since I encountered it, which is a personal problem — is what it means that this was the thing Uma chose to say. She had one advisory slot. She did not use it on craft or on the industry or on the experience of being directed by someone who is going to make you very famous at the cost of some other things. She used it on shoes.

The most charitable interpretation is that the shoes are the one variable she could control. The rest of the Tarantino experience is fixed: the genius, the long hours, the blocking, the rewrites. Only the footwear is in the actor's hands. Or rather: on the actor's feet.

Uma has not expanded on the advice. She appears to consider it complete as stated. The shoes were kept on. The film is in production.

The advice worked.