Jamie Foxx Recounts Trying to Talk Idris Elba Out of ‘Django’ Role

Quentin Tarantino has multiple classic movies under his belt. But none of his nine feature films did better at the box office than Django Unchained. While talking to an audience at the Toronto Film Festival, Jamie Foxx explained he used every trick in the book to land the role as the movie’s main character. 

When Foxx’s management told him that he wasn’t on the short-list of actors to land the role of Django, the actor decided to take matters into his own hands. Foxx told the audience a story about how he ran into Idris Elba, who was the favorite to land the role at that time. According to Foxx, the two stumbled upon the topic of Django Unchained. He saw it as a perfect opportunity to finesse Idris Elba into declining the role. Foxx did this by trying to convince Elba that he was too pretty.

“You’re beautiful black ass riding up on a horse, there’s going to be some problems for everyone,” Foxx joked. 

As known, Foxx ultimately landed the role. Per Tarantino himself, Elba’s nationality was the deciding factor in pulling him from the list. 

“Yeah, Idris is British and this is an American story,” Tarantino told The Sun in 2013. “I think a problem with a lot of movies that deal with this issue is they cast British actors to play the Southerners and it goes a long way to distancing the movie. They put on their gargoyle masks and they do their accents and you are not telling an American story anymore.”