Uma Thurman was on top of the action world after starring in Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill movies, but the actress said she chose to reject most action roles after that for over two decades. Thurman finally joined the new action movie on Netflix, The Old Guard 2, and she explained in a recent interview why these roles have been so rare for her since she enjoyed her Kill Bill success so many years ago.

Thurman appeared on The Tonight Show Featuring Jimmy Fallon and talked about her new movie role and why she didn’t want to take on action roles after Kill Bill. After the Tarantino movie, she had a few action-based films, with My Super Ex-Girlfriend in 2006 and Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief in 2010, but neither of those required the intensive fight scenes of something like The Bride in Kill Bill. According to Thurman, that was by design:

“I never really followed Kill Bill up with action because I didn’t kind of want to be in a whole bunch of ‘B’ action movies. When you do Kill Bill, you never stop hearing about, you know, it’s like, ‘Oh, got to be very careful about what I do next.’ So I did other stuff.”

This led to her finally deciding on a real action movie in 2025 with The Old Guard 2. Thurman said that Charlize Theron caused her to decide to return to action movies 21 years after Kill Bill: Volume 2.

“Charlize was just so epic in [2020’s The Old Guard]. And so I thought, ‘Well, I could go do this for her in that. Where she’s kind of taking the genre there. I’ll go support her and fight her and battle her out.'”

What This Means For Uma Thurman’s Career

Uma Thurman Mostly Disappeared Into Smaller Roles

Most fans expected to see Uma Thurman in a ton of action movies after her performance in Kill Bill. However, Thurman wanted to do something different in her career and had serious doubts about accepting action roles after those two Quentin Tarantino films. Thurman is right in ᴀssuming that most action movies made are B-grade films, and she didn’t want anything to do with that. Thurman wanted to appear in movies that allowed her to stretch her acting muscles and not just take money to do quick action films.

What this meant was very little work over the next 20 years. However, that seems okay with Thurman, who preferred to work with filmmakers like Lars von Trier and on television shows like Chambers and Suspicion. It also allowed her to work on the stage, as she starred in The Parisian Woman on Broadway from 2017 to 2018, proving she was up for serious dramatic roles as much as she was for any action performance.

Our Take On Uma Thurman Rejecting More Action Movies After Kill Bill

Uma Thurman Wanted To Protect Her Reputation

Uma Thurman looked like the next big thing in action movies, but that never happened. While that disappointed fans, Thurman did what was best for her career, family, and mental well-being. She didn’t want to get pigeonholed as an action movie actress, allowing her to experiment and find her place in Hollywood. It also allowed Kill Bill fans to get excited when she announced her return to action movies, which should make The Old Guard 2 a can’t-miss return to form for Uma Thurman.