“The Hateful Eight” Hates on Six Strings: Film Includes Real Destruction of Antique Martin

Feb 02, 2016 by Chris McMahon

Amidst all the violence in Quentin Tarantino’s latest film “The Hateful Eight” is the scene in which John Ruth, played by Kurt Russell, grabs a guitar from Daisy Domergue, played by Jennifer Jason Leigh, and smashes it, eliciting horror.

“What was supposed to happen was we were supposed to go up to that point, cut and trade guitars and smash the double,” explains the film’s Academy Award-winning sound mixer Mark Ulano, as quoted in SSNInsider.com. “Well, somehow that didn’t get communicated to Kurt, so when you see that happen on the frame, Jennifer’s reaction is genuine.”
Classical guitars in the Martin Museum

Classical guitars in the Martin Museum.
Photo by Edward Blake.

The victim was an authentic Martin from the 1870s, on loan from the Martin Guitar Museum, Ulano said, and everyone was pretty freaked out when they realized what happened. “Tarantino was in a corner of the room with a funny curl on his lips, because he got something out of it with the performance,” Ulano added.

Martin Museum representatives asked only two questions when informed about the destruction of the loaner, according to SSNInsider.com: “Do you need another one?" And "Can we please have all the pieces to display in our museum?”

“The Hateful Eight” is set in the years just after the American Civil War, which ran from 1861 to 1865. While the film earns points for authenticity in terms of the guitar, the song played by Domergue is the traditional Australian folk ballad "Jim Jones at Botany Bay," which was published in 1907, almost four decades after when the film was set.

Martin Responds to “Hateful Eight” Destruction of Antique Six String

Feb 04, 2016 by Chris McMahon

Reverb’s story “The Hateful Eight” Hates on Six Strings” contains information about the destruction of the priceless 145-years-old instrument that Dick Boak, director of the museum, archives and special projects for C.F. Martin & Co., says the company was not previously aware of.

In the film, John Ruth, played by Kurt Russell, grabs a guitar from Daisy Domergue, played by Jennifer Jason Leigh, and smashes it, eliciting horror. However, the smashed guitar was an authentic Martin from the 1870s, on loan from the Martin Guitar Museum, rather than one of several copies on hand for the shoot.

“We were informed that it was an accident on set,” Boak says. “We assumed that a scaffolding or something fell on it. We understand that things happen, but at the same time we can’t take this lightly. All this about the guitar being smashed being written into the script and that somebody just didn’t tell the actor, this is all new information to us. We didn’t know anything about the script or Kurt Russell not being told that it was a priceless, irreplaceable artifact from the Martin Museum.”

According to the film’s Academy Award-winning sound mixer Mark Ulano, as quoted in SSNInsider.com, the scene was to be shot up to a certain point, a cut made, the guitar swapped out for a double and for the double to be smashed. “Well, somehow that didn’t get communicated to Kurt, so when you see that happen on the frame, Jennifer’s reaction is genuine,” Ulano said, as quoted in SSNInsider.com.

Further, Boak says that Martin did not offer a replacement, as stated in the SSNInsider.com. "As a result of the incident, the company will no longer loan guitars to movies under any circumstances,” Boak says.

To add insult to injury, Boak says the guitar was insured for its purchase price, which doesn’t reflect its value as an irreplaceable museum artifact. Boak also says that Martin requested that the pieces be returned for a possible restoration, not for inclusion in the Martin Museum as stated in SSNInsider.com. “Upon inspection of the pieces, we realized that the guitar was beyond fixing,” Boak said. “It’s destroyed.”

“We want to make sure that people know that the incident was very distressing to us,” Boak says. “We can’t believe that it happened. I don’t think anything can really remedy this. We’ve been remunerated for the insurance value, but it’s not about the money. It’s about the preservation of American musical history and heritage.”

That is pretty great. Love the authenticity. The guitar, while now unplayable, is more famous than before, and the museum can (if promoted enough) feature it as "The Guitar" in The Hateful Eight. Unfortunately, the film isn't really up for many Oscars, so the prestige of the film and general popularity a few years from now will be low, but they could still put up a display about it with Kurt's photo and the film poster.