Christoph Waltz was rushed off stage of a French talk show as shots of gunfire erupted in the audience.
Waltz was being interviewed on The Grand Journal talk show at the Cannes film festival when two loud bangs were heard from the audience. As the two-time Oscar winner and the talk show hosts ducked for cover, someone in the audience cried out, “There’s someone shooting,” according to Fox News .
The first reports about the incident said that a man fired off blanks and threatened the audience with a grenade. The police later released a statement assuring the public that the sounds came from firecrackers.
The brief, chaotic incident did not stop host Michel Denisot from continuing the interview with the 56-year-old actor minutes later. In a recent interview, The Business Standard reports, Waltz said he nearly gave up on his acting career as he feared type-casting based on his German heritage. Waltz explained that when he was introduced to Paul Kohner, a famous Hollywood agent from the 1930s, Kohner cautioned him about entering the acting world.
“‘But you have to ask yourself, do you want to spend the rest of your life walking through the background yelling 'Hail Hitler'?' And that was probably the most valuable thing he said to me. I said, 'No, thank you', and went back to Europe," Waltz recounts of Kohner’s warning.
Ironically, Waltz is best known for the role that rocketed him to Hollywood fame, Nazi Colonel Hans Landa, of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds . The role earned Waltz his first Oscar.
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