Brad Pitt Teases Potential ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’ Mini-Series

By Anna Tingley

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – “Once Upon a Time in…Hollywood” is still in theaters, but star Brad Pitt says a mini-series may be on the horizon.

After an intimate profile with Pitt appeared in the New York Times this week — revealing the movie star’s thoughts on fame and his struggles with alcoholism –“Times” writer Kyle Buchanan published some unreleased details from the profile, including Pitt’s confirmation that Quentin Tarantino discussed a streaming version of “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood” that would expand the film into several episodes with more footage. “Yeah he’s talked about it,” Pitt said. “It’s a pretty arousing idea.”

Pitt also explained why he thinks an episodic version of Tarantino’s fantastical Manson murder story may find more success in today’s streaming era. “I’m curious to see if movies last, if movies stick around,” Pitt said. “What I notice about the younger generation is that they’re used to receiving a lot of information at a much faster pace, and they’re more inclined to watch a short series of episodes where you can stay in it as long as you want or jump out whenever you get bored.”

Pitt added that while he loves the “transportive experience” of going to the movie theater, which he guessed was one of the main draws to Tarantino’s latest blockbuster, he also thinks episodic series can lend more freedom to character and story development. “I look at series where you can spend much more time on characters and story and explore angles you don’t always get to in film,” he said.

He cited Tarantino’s 2015 film “Hateful Eight,” which the prolific director re-purposed as a four-part mini-series that debuted on Netflix in April. “It’s almost the best of both worlds,” Pitt said about the small-screen adaptation. “You have the cinema experience that exists, but you can actually put more content in a series format.”