Bruce Lee’s Daughter Says She Doesn’t Know What Quentin Tarantino’s “Issues Are” With Her Father: “He Has Borrowed From Him Quite A Bit”

Bruce Lee‘s daughter, Shannon Lee, has once again addressed Quentin Tarantino‘s controversial portrayal of her father in the 2019 satire Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

After Shannon and Tarantino got into a public debate about her father’s portrayal in the film, she recently speculated that Tarantino possibly heard some “negative” stories about the legendary martial artist, which may have informed his decision to portray him as a cocky movie star in the film.

“It’s interesting. I actually don’t know,” she said during a recent interview with The Telegraph. “I’ve never met [Tarantino]. I don’t know what his issues are with my father. Clearly, he thinks my father is cool, because he has borrowed from him quite a bit.”

She continued, “But at the same time, I think he has been told a lot of stories by people who have encountered my father and had a negative reaction.”

Shannon added that she thought some people viewed her father as “uppity.”

She continued, “They found him to be overly confident or arrogant. I have to say, in my experience, the stories are mostly from white men. I think Quentin may have been told a lot of those stories and believes them.”

In the movie, Bruce (portrayed by Mike Moh) gets challenged by Brad Pitt’s character to a fight. Bruce, who responds in a rather cocky fashion, ends up humiliated after he gets tossed into a car.

Tarantino previously doubled down on the creative decisions he took with Bruce’s portrayal. During a 2019 press junket, he said, “Bruce Lee was kind of an arrogant guy,” per Variety. “The way he was talking, I didn’t just make a lot of that up. I heard him say things like that, to that effect. If people are saying, ‘Well he never said he could beat up Muhammad Ali.’ Well, yeah, he did.”

Tarantino also denied China’s request to recut the film after the country threatened to block its theatrical release.

Shannon, who is reportedly the caretaker of Bruce’s estate and foundation, did not buy Tarantino’s excuses, telling Variety in 2019, “[Tarantino] can portray Bruce Lee however he wanted to, and he did,” she said. “But it’s a little disingenuous for him to say, ‘Well, this is how he was, but this is a fictional movie, so don’t worry too much about it.’”

She later said that he “could shut up about it” or tell viewers, “‘That shouldn’t be taken as how he really was.'”

Shannon is currently the executive producer of Warrior, the Cinemax martial arts series based on a treatment written by her father.