If you needed any further proof of Quentin Tarantino's deeply problematic past, look no further than this 2003 interview with Howard Stern where he adamantly defends known sexual predator Roman Polanski.
Jezebel pointed out audio of the Kill Bill director unabashedly defending Polanski's sexual encounter with a 13-year-old girl. When Stern asks him why Hollywood would still embrace "this mad man," Tarantino did not mince words.
“He didn’t rape a 13-year-old. It was statutory rape...he had sex with a minor," he insisted. "That’s not rape. To me, when you use the word rape, you’re talking about violent, throwing them down—it’s like one of the most violent crimes in the world. You can’t throw the word rape around. It’s like throwing the word ‘racist’ around. It doesn’t apply to everything people use it for.”
Co-host Robin Quivers is taken aback and reminds him that Polanski loaded his victim with pills and alcohol, he responded, "That was not the case AT ALL. She wanted to have it and dated the guy." As if his response couldn't be any more trash, he goes on to insist that American society is to blame for their perception of the Polanski case. "And by the way, we’re talking about America’s morals, not talking about the morals in Europe and everything."
In October 2017, Tarantino admitted to knowing and decidedly not reporting incidents involving his Hollywood buddy Harvey Weinstein (including accounts from his then-girlfriend Mira Sorvino). “I knew enough to do more than I did," he told New York Times. "There was more to it than just the normal rumors, the normal gossip. It wasn’t secondhand. I knew he did a couple of these things.”
Tarantino's next movie is about the Manson Family murders. Polanski was married to the late Sharon Tate, who was one of Manson's murder victims.
