LOS ANGELES: Veteran TV host David Letterman has revealed that Quentin Tarantino once threatened to thrash him and in his response, he gave the filmmaker an option to choose his weapon -- his fists or a bat.
The 72-year-old shared the story during his appearance on Showtime's "Desus & Mero".
He said the feud started after he interviewed a "famous star", who was apparently dating Tarantino at the time.
"There was one guest on the show and her girlfriend was somebody he was dating. A famous star. And I was saying, 'No, you're not dating Quentin Tarantino. ' And she said, 'Yes, yes I am. ' And I said, 'Oh, please tell me this isn't true...I'm pretending that I'm stunned that this glorious movie star is dating this little squirrelly guy," Letterman revealed.
Days later, Tarantino called up the TV host and threatened to beat him to death.
"He starts screaming at me, I'm going to beat you to death, I'm going to kill you. I'm coming to New York and I'm going to beat the crap out of you. How can you say that about me? I said, 'Quentin, hang on a bit. ' This is so going good, I'm going to get my producer to pick up the other line..." After his producer joined the call, Tarantino again threatened Letterman.
"He was full-blown, clinically goofy," the host said.
He then asked Tarantino, "'How do you want to do this? Bat or fists?' He said, 'Bat. You get me a bat and I'll beat the hell out of you with it...There's no cooling off. It just keeps blowing up."
Letterman said he finally met Tarantino when the filmmaker came to promote "Inglorious Bastards" on his show.
"He was in the make-up room. Typically, I would not want to meet a person before the show. But this time, I went to see Quentin. I go in there and he was with his publicist...I said, 'Remember that thing when you were going to beat me and we had a plane ticket waiting and a baseball bat ready...I think you owe me an apology."
Letterman said though Tarantino was not ready to apologise, his publicist made him do so.
"So finally he apologised. But he was not certain that he owed me an apology," he added.