David Fincher Cut 60 Pages From Quentin Tarantino's 230-Page Script for Brad Pitt Sequel

David Fincher has revealed that he cut 60 pages from Quentin Tarantino's original 230-page screenplay for The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth, trimming what he described as 'essentially two movies' into a single feature for Brad Pitt's returning stuntman character.

Fincher directed the Netflix film from a script by Tarantino, who created the character of stuntman Cliff Booth for his 2019 film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Brad Pitt, 62, who won the best supporting actor Oscar for the role, returns as Booth.

In a joint interview with Empire magazine, the pair's first together, Fincher recalled the size of the original draft. 'The first draft I read was 230 pages. It was essentially two movies,' he said. The cuts, made before filming began, left a script of roughly 170 pages.

A page of screenplay conventionally equates to about a minute of screen time, which would have put the first draft at nearly four hours.

Fincher said the task was to find 'the Venn diagram' of what Pitt, Tarantino and he himself each wanted to do.

He said the finished film runs for about two hours and 20 minutes. It opens in Imax cinemas on 25 November before arriving on Netflix on 23 December. The Imax run is reported to last two weeks.

The 25 November opening falls the day before US Thanksgiving and will be on about 350 Imax screens, according to the website World of Reel.

Cliff Booth Returns to a Changed Hollywood

The sequel moves the action from 1969 to Los Angeles in 1977. Booth now works as a bartender and projectionist, and uses his skills to solve problems for people in the film industry. He becomes entangled in a criminal plot involving violence, ambition and rivalries behind the scenes of Hollywood.

Pitt is joined in the cast by Elizabeth Debicki, Scott Caan, Carla Gugino, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Peter Weller.

Tarantino told Empire he did not regard the new film as a 'hangout movie' in the manner of its predecessor, which he said audiences watched knowing it was heading towards the Manson family murders at Cielo Drive.

Fincher, 64, whose films include Zodiac and The Social Network, said he liked the idea of 'a story around a bonfire'. He has directed Pitt before, in Seven and Fight Club, and made Mank and The Killer for Netflix.

The 2019 film, which won two Oscars, followed fading actor Rick Dalton, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, and Booth, his stunt double, as they struggled to stay relevant in a changing film industry.

Tarantino Hands Over the Director's Chair

Tarantino, 63, has said his tenth film as director will be his last. He has previously said he loves the Cliff Booth script but was not interested in revisiting old characters for that final project.

He chose Fincher to direct and has said he and Fincher are the two best directors, according to reports of his remarks on The Church of Tarantino podcast. The collaboration marks the first time Tarantino has handed a completed feature script centred on one of his own characters to another filmmaker.

Netflix acquired the project. The film has not yet been released, so audiences cannot judge what was cut.