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You had to do a lot of driving in Death Proof...
“Yeah, we did about 98 percent of it. I didn't turn it over and flip it and crash it, and I didn't do the big jump.”

Have you done that type of stunt work before?
“Oh, yeah. It was tough to do in Dark Blue and tough in Breakdown. The toughest driving stuff that I've ever had to do was in Escape from L.A. when I was on the motorcycle because it was at night with an eye patch on and we wanted [my jacket] to fly, but it wanted to catch in the back wheel.

I'm dodging people and going through this maze of stuff, going about 50 miles an hour through this stuff, and I didn't want to hit anyone. It was poorly lit and the nighttime stuff was kind of weird because I was driving very fast, and then the other stuff was in the daytime. That was much better.

The only problem there is that you're on the wrong side of the road and you're going to bump and bump and back off and then come over here and do the same thing. There was a lot of dialogue there that's not used and some different attitudes. So when you're doing that at 90, 100 miles an hour on a two lane road, you're sort of like flying in formation. You can't look ahead. You have to look at the car because the camera is out here. I'm trying to balance and get the camera in the right position. The camera car is running fast ahead with the arm out and that arm is going to swing back and forth. We've got it timed out and she's going to kind of stay in the middle and when she sees me come over, she's going to back off.

The timing is very critical.

The problem is that when the camera car is over here, the other car is over here and you're here in the wrong lane doing 100 miles an hour. You have to trust very much that a cow won't run onto the road, a dog, a coyote, or another car will somehow slip by one of the roads that theoretically they told you are shut off. Some kid just happens to do this, 'Whoa, hey, you're not supposed to go out there,' and the next thing I know I'm doing a hundred, I would've never seen the guy because I'm focused over here doing this. I would've hit this guy doing a hundred miles and hour when they would've been doing fifty, which is a hundred and fifty mile an hour crash. I don't care what you're strapped into, you're not coming away from that. To put that out of your head and play the character while you're doing it, that's what you get paid to do in that situation - aside from drive the car good. So that's work. Six weeks of that is work. To go to work everyday, you do say, 'I hope I come back today.'”

Does Quentin Tarantino push it a lot?
“Well, Quentin is like everyone else. He tries to get it right. He tries to get it right. I admired that about him. Did he push it? Absolutely, as much as he should. It was never done improperly.”

When you accept a role with Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, is it just part of the quid pro quo that they're going to pick your brain over every movie you've ever made?
“I think that is fair to say, but in all honesty, as you would expect, it's very flattering. It's very kind and makes you feel very appreciated.”

What was the weirdest film in your resume that they wanted to know a lot about?
“[Quentin] can be shocking. Quentin can shock you because you think that Quentin knows a lot, but he isn't going to know about that episode of Man from U.N.C.L.E. I did. Then when you say something, and he goes, 'Oh, yeah, and then that character says this!' Then he does the whole scene that you did and then you realize that you cannot possibly keep up. Never ever get him in the game of movie trivia. There is no one that can beat him. I will bet a million dollars on him. You can come up with someone who can study it and they would have to be, number one) like he is, having grown up with it, having done it like he did. And number two) they have to be something else, which is a savant. He is a total savant.

As a matter of fact, if you ever want to do something interesting with Quentin, if you get the opportunity, it's like one of these things that I would tell the CIA, if you want to have a conversation with Quentin that he might not remember, do it with your back to a movie screen because he cannot look at you. If you put him in a room with, probably a television set, but a movie screen and you ask him a question, here's the answer, 'Yeah, that's uh…' He's out. He cannot function. He's right there and will pretend that he's listening to you and he can't function. He's locked in. The minute that projectionist turns on the movie he's gone. That is the absolute truth. I went, 'Ah, that's the Achilles heel here.'”