EXCLUSIVE: Learning today that his script The Hateful Eight leaked after he gave it to a small circle of actors, Quentin Tarantino tells me that he’s so upset that he has decided that he will not direct that film next. So basically that means the conversation that will be circulating around town following this story with Tarantino goes from an ensemble Western to a whodunit. As in, which actor or their reps leaked the script that, as a result, is going on the shelf — literally a bookstore shelf, because Tarantino tells me he will publish it first and maybe revisit the prospect of a movie in the next five years.

“I’m very, very depressed,” Tarantino said. “I finished a script, a first draft, and I didn’t mean to shoot it until next winter, a year from now. I gave it to six people, and apparently it’s gotten out today.” He learned that when his longtime agent Mike Simpson began getting phone calls from agents looking to pitch their clients for roles in the ensemble Western.

So who could have done this? “I gave it to one of the producers on Django Unchained, Reggie Hudlin, and he let an agent come to his house and read it,” Tarantino said. “That’s a betrayal, but not crippling because the agent didn’t end up with the script. There is an ugly maliciousness to the rest of it. I gave it to three actors: Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, Tim Roth. The one I know didn’t do this is Tim Roth. One of the others let their agent read it, and that agent has now passed it on to everyone in Hollywood. I don’t know how these fucking agents work, but I’m not making this next. I’m going to publish it, and that’s it for now. I give it out to six people, and if I can’t trust them to that degree, then I have no desire to make it. I’ll publish it. I’m done. I’ll move on to the next thing. I’ve got 10 more where that came from.”

Watch that video above. That’s how Quentin Tarantino reacted to a guy who asked him how we was doing. Now imagine what he’s going to do when he finds out who it was that leaked his script. I picture him burying the person alive ala Kill Bill. Or maybe he’ll take him to an abandoned warehouse and cut off his ear just for fun. Look, there are two types of people you just don’t mess with: people who are bigger and stronger than you, and people who are crazier than you. Tarantino falls into that second category. He’s a brilliant lunatic, but a lunatic nonetheless. When you mess with a lunatic’s babies (his movies), he’ll turn the world upside down to get revenge. May God have mercy on that poor person’s soul.

– Ryan