Between a cast that includes Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Kyle Chandler, and Uma Thurman and creators/showrunners Brian Koppelman and David Levien behind the scenes, Showtime’s Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber boasts and all-star pedigree. But viewers are in for one more Oscar-winning surprise when the series premieres on Sunday night: The unmistakable voice of Quentin Tarantino serving as the show’s narrator.
So just how did the Oscar-winning filmmaker behind Pulp Fiction, Inglourious Basterds, and Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood end up serving as the voice to tell the story of the rise and fall of controversial Uber co-founder/CEO/“Terrible Person” Travis Kalanick (as played by Gordon-Levitt). By being a super fan of Billions, Koppelman and Levien’s other hit Showtime series.
“What David [Levien] and I knew was in the last two years—if you listen to the podcast, you know what a big deal Quentin’s work is to us—he wrote to us that he had become a really big Billions watcher and fan,” Koppelman told The Wrap. “He watches it very closely and is very engaged with every reference and every character’s journey. So that’s why we thought maybe it was possible he would do it. We knew he liked our work to some extent, or was engaging it.”
Knowing that he was a fan, Koppelman took a gamble and shot Tarantino an email asking him to both be a guest on his podcast, “The Moment,” and also to do some voice work on Super Pumped. When QT readily agreed, Koppelman wanted to make sure that the auteur knew he had just committed to two things. “I wrote back, ‘You know you said yes to both things?’ and he said, perfect Tarantino-ish, ‘Yeah I know what I said yes to,’” Koppelman shared.
It’s not the first time Tarantino has allowed his fandom for a certain TV show to bleed into his creative work. In 1995, at the behest of George Clooney—who he had worked with on From Dusk Till Dawn—Tarantino directed an episode of ER. Ten years later, he directed “Grave Danger,” the two-part finale to CSI’s fifth season.
Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber premieres on Sunday, February 27, 2022.
(Via The Wrap)