15 Actors Who Appeared in the Most Quentin Tarantino Movies

Quentin Tarantino is one of the most well-known American directors of the past few decades. He’s likely familiar to movie buffs and casual viewers alike and has made a series of great movies ever since he exploded onto the scene in the early 1990s. In his 30-ish years of directing feature films, he’s worked with numerous actors on more than one occasion, making something of a core, reliable team of talented cast members.

These actors have collaborated the most with Tarantino throughout his directing career and have had two or more appearances throughout Tarantino’s released movies so far. There’s a degree of uncertainty regarding what Tarantino’s supposedly final directorial effort will be, but whatever it is, it marks another opportunity for some of the following actors to appear in one more Tarantino film… potentially.

15

Brad Pitt

2 Appearances

Brad Pitt has only been in two Quentin Tarantino movies to date, but since he had two sizable roles in two big ones, they’re still worth mentioning. The first of those was in Inglourious Basterds, playing Lieutenant Aldo Raine, who’s maybe the closest thing the film has to a main character, given he’s the leader of the titular Basterds: a group of soldiers hunting Nazi soldiers during World War II, in occupied France.

He was also one of many well-known actors who appeared in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and it was that movie that won him his first Oscar: a Best Supporting Actor win. He’s set to appear in a sequel to Once Upon a Time in Hollywood that admittedly won’t be directed by Tarantino, but will be directed by David Fincher, who’s directed Pitt before (in Se7en, Fight Club, and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button).

14

Leonardo DiCaprio

2 Appearances

Like Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio has only been in two Quentin Tarantino movies, sure, but they were big movies and sizable parts. One of those times was in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood in the lead role, playing Rick Dalton, a struggling actor who relies on his stuntman for support (and Pitt plays that stuntman, so the two actors have numerous scenes together here).

And then there’s Django Unchained, which is perhaps the boldest and best Western DiCaprio has starred in to date. He plays Calvin Candie, who’s a plantation owner and brutal slaver, standing as likely the most despicable character DiCaprio has ever played. He’s great as a villain in Django Unchained, and also compelling as the flawed protagonist of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

13

Omar Doom

3 Appearances

The most noteworthy performance Omar Doom has given in a Quentin Tarantino movie so far would be in Inglourious Basterds, where he appears alongside Eli Roth as one of the Basterds who infiltrates the cinema that the film’s tense finale takes place in. In said scene, he ends up doing something that’s not historically accurate (if you know, you know), but it is pretty awesome.

He shares a first name with that character: Pfc. Omar Ulmer, and then he’s also had small roles in two other Quentin Tarantino movies: Death Proof, where he played Nate, and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, where he appeared as Donnie. He hasn’t otherwise acted in a great many other movies, and is more prolific as a musician, releasing music under the name STRAIGHT RAZOR.

12

Michael Bacall

3 Appearances

Things get a little confusing here, because Michael Bacall, like Omar Doom, is an actor who appeared in both Death Proof and Inglourious Basterds, and in the former, he played a character named Omar. Then, in Inglourious Basterds, he plays Michael Zimmerman, who’s another member of the titular squad run by Brad Pitt’s character.

And then the third movie of Tarantino’s that Bacall appeared in was Django Unchained, where his role as Smitty Bacall was an uncredited one, but it still counts. Like Doom, Bacall is perhaps better known for work he’s done outside the realm of acting, as he’s also a screenwriter who’s credited with co-writing films like Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, 21 Jump Street, 22 Jump Street, and the upcoming Edgar Wright-directed The Running Man.

11

Michael Bowen

3 Appearances

If you’re a fan of Breaking Bad, you probably know Michael Bowen for his role as Jack Welker on that show, since that character pulled off the difficult feat of being even more evil than season 5-era Walter White. Before then, Bowen was also featured in three Quentin Tarantino movies: Jackie Brown, Kill Bill: Vol. 1, and Django Unchained.

The last of those roles was a pretty small one, but his role in Kill Bill was a little more significant, since he played the irredeemable Buck, who ended up being one of the first people The Bride killed, chronologically speaking (and deservedly so). And then, in Jackie Brown, he was Detective Mark Dargus, who acted as a sidekick of sorts to Michael Keaton’s character, ATF agent Ray Nicolette.

10

Walton Goggins

3 Appearances

Even though Walton Goggins first got recognition in the early 2000s for his prominent role on The Shield, it felt like it took at least another decade for him to become a well-known name. Even now, there’s a chance he’s still a little underrated overall, but at least there’s a little more love for Goggins out there than there used to be.

A main role in Justified helped get him more attention, as did his performance in 2012’s Django Unchained as the villainous and menacing Billy Crash. He got a larger role in The Hateful Eight and then a cameo appearance in the extended version of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and if the latter’s counted, that takes Goggins to three Tarantino appearances in total.

9

Bruce Dern

3 Appearances

Just like Walton Goggins, Bruce Dern has been featured in three Tarantino films: Django Unchained, The Hateful Eight, and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, proving to be a relatively recent favorite actor of Tarantino’s. Unlike Goggins, Dern’s three performances are all included in the theatrical cuts of the three films.

Dern’s a veteran actor whose earliest credits date back to the 1960s, making it a little unusual that it took until the 2010s before he was cast in a Tarantino film. The early 2010s did see something of a resurgence for the actor, thanks to the Tarantino roles and an Oscar-nominated performance in the excellent dramedy Nebraska.

8

Harvey Keitel

3 Appearances

If you need someone reliable to play a tough, no-nonsense gangster or criminal, few actors are more well-suited to the role than Harvey Keitel. It’s something Martin Scorsese realized back in the 1970s when he frequently cast Keitel in his crime movies (and some of his non-crime movies), and it’s something Tarantino realized near the start of his filmmaking career, too.

Keitel is a large part of Quentin Tarantino’s first two movies, Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, especially in the former, where he’s arguably the lead character. He brought a tremendous amount of charm and talent to both movies and had a third appearance in 2009’s Inglourious Basterds via an uncredited cameo (though only his voice is heard).

7

Uma Thurman

3 Appearances

If Kill Bill is considered one movie, Uma Thurman‘s total number of Tarantino appearances would be two, with the other film being Pulp Fiction. However, Kill Bill was released in two volumes in two separate years, so even if they’re ideally watched together, they are two films in many ways.

Whether you count the number of collaborations between Thurman and Tarantino as two or three, it seems surprisingly low either way. That might be because Thurman was far and away the lead in the action-packed Kill Bill, with her being in almost every scene and front and center on all the posters. In Pulp Fiction, she’s also on all the posters, though she had a supporting role in the actual film (albeit an incredibly memorable one).

6

Kurt Russell

3 Appearances

Kurt Russell is an actor probably closely tied to filmmaker John Carpenter, though he’s also been featured in numerous Tarantino movies. The first of these was 2007’s Death Proof, which probably remains his most prominent role in a Tarantino film, given he was the main villain throughout the film, whereas most other characters were only in the first or second half.

He was also one of the titular eight in The Hateful Eight: he also had a small role in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood as both the narrator and a stunt coordinator named Randy Miller (referencing his role as a murderous stuntman in Death Proof).

5

Tim Roth

4 Appearances (Including Deleted Scenes)

Like Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth was a central figure in the first two Tarantino movies: Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. His role in Reservoir Dogs emerged as one of the most important, given his character’s backstory, and he’s also memorable in Pulp Fiction, appearing in its opening and closing scenes.

He was then absent from the films of Quentin Tarantino for just over two decades before reappearing in The Hateful Eight in one of the main roles. His total appearances come to four only if you count his role in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which was filmed but unfortunately cut for time (perhaps to keep the film from feeling too drawn out).

4

Michael Parks

4 Appearances

Michael Parks is probably the least well-known actor out of Tarantino’s most frequent collaborators, but his contributions shouldn’t be overlooked. He usually only showed up for one scene per movie but could often steal said scene, given Parks’ unusual screen presence and his acting style, which seems both laidback and intense all at once.

He played two different roles across the two volumes of Kill Bill and reprised one of those roles for his appearance in Death Proof. Finally, he had a cameo in Django Unchained in the same scene as Tarantino’s own infamous cameo. Unfortunately, Parks passed away at the age of 77 in 2017, meaning Django Unchained will remain his final Tarantino collaboration.

3

Michael Madsen

5 Appearances

Michael Madsen has had remarkably consistent appearances throughout Tarantino’s filmography. Still, his most famous (or perhaps infamous) Tarantino role remains his first. He played the terrifying and cruel Mr. Blonde in Reservoir Dogs, the character responsible for the film’s most notoriously violent scene.

He was prominently featured in Kill Bill Vol. 2 and showed up briefly in Vol. 1. His most recent two appearances have been as part of the ensemble cast in The Hateful Eight and a cameo in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. He’s one of the few actors who may end up appearing in at least one Tarantino film in four different decades, should he receive a role in the final film the filmmaker ends up directing.

2

Samuel L. Jackson

6 appearances

Samuel L. Jackson is a staple of Tarantino’s filmography to the point where it sometimes feels strange to see a Tarantino movie that doesn’t have Samuel L. Jackson in any capacity. He had some of the best moments of Pulp Fiction and proved just as capable of stealing scenes in 1997’s Jackie Brown.

The 2000s saw Jackson have a cameo in two Tarantino movies: first as an organ player in Kill Bill Vol. 2 and then as the narrator in Inglourious Basterds. The 2010s saw him give a memorable supporting performance in Django Unchained. Then, in 2015, he was arguably the central character in The Hateful Eight (he got first billing, at least, out of the eight characters referred to in the title).

1

Zoë Bell

7 Appearances (Including Stunt Roles)

Stunt double/actor Zoë Bell has technically appeared in more Quentin Tarantino movies than any other actor. However, three of her seven films with the director have had her doing stunts rather than playing a character. Still, she’s technically on-screen and is a key reason why the fight sequences in Kill Bill are so good… but she’s not credited as an actor for either Kill Bill, and she similarly did stuntwork for Inglourious Basterds without doing traditional acting.

Bell’s most impressive role in a Tarantino movie was probably Death Proof, given she got to show off her acting and stunt skills in that film, with her involvement in the climactic car chase being particularly harrowing. Small roles in Django Unchained, The Hateful Eight, and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood take her total Tarantino appearances to seven, making her — somewhat surprisingly — the most frequently cast Tarantino collaborator.

NEXT: Every Quentin Tarantino Movie, Ranked by the Number of F-Bombs