Austin Butler Was Jazzed To Fight ‘Tyler Durden’ AKA Brad Pitt In Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, But I’m More Grossed Out By How That Pitbull Injured Him

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Austin Butler has gone toe-to-toe with Elvis Presley’s legacy, played a murderous biker in 2024’s The Bikeriders, and embodied Feyd-Rautha in Dune: Part Two. But in 2019, he was cast in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, where he squared off against none other than Brad Pitt. For The Dead Don’t Die actor, who grew up on the best ‘90s movies like Fight Club, the chance to spar with “Tyler Durden” himself felt like a dream come true. The reality of filming that sequence, however, came with a painful reminder of just how intense Pitt really is — and how dangerous a certain pitbull could be on set.

In a recent interview with Men’s Health’s YouTube channel, Butler broke down the process of tackling stunt-heavy roles in projects such as Caught Stealing, The Bikeriders, Dune: Part Two, and, of course, Quentin Tarantino’s Hollywood epic. Reflecting on the climactic brawl, he described what it was like to go toe-to-toe with Fight Club’s iconic brawler, Brad Pitt:

It was initially going to be a lot longer of a fight. But when we got there, [Tarantino] said, 'You know what? It doesn't make sense for you to be a good fighter. Brad's character is, like, a special forces guy, so if he can't take you out quickly, then it doesn't feel right.’ When I think of being in a fight with Tyler Durden, that’s a dream come true.

The actor, 34, recalled the bloody climax where his character, Tex Watson, faces off against Brad Pitt’s Cliff Booth and Booth’s loyal pit bull, Brandy. The Elvis star revealed that to prepare, the stunt team wrapped his hand in leather so the 80-pound dog could safely bite down. But during one rehearsal, the pitbull clamped on with enough force to tear his rotator cuff. He continued:

In rehearsals, he got me in such a way that he tore my rotator cuff. He was very strong. So then we did it on the right arm on the day. I realized I need to hold on tight, otherwise he's going to rip my arm off. That was that. That was fun.

For the actual shoot, the Eddington actor switched to his right arm, while his stunt double, Braxton McAllister, took over for the most painful beats of the sequence, including Brandy’s jaw-dropping attack on Tex’s groin.

Few endings in recent memory have been as wild and cathartic as Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. The 2019 film closes with an alternate-history twist on the infamous Manson Family murders, sending four of Charles Manson’s followers, including Austin Butler’s Tex Watson, to the home of Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt). What follows is pure Tarantino excess, as the would-be killers are destroyed in a brutal, cartoonishly violent showdown.

That choice left Tex with a terribly violent beating. And while Cliff Booth was the primary punisher, he had help from his pitbull, Brandy, and Butler still bears the scars of that collaboration.

Butler’s showdown with Pitt and Brandy was shortened for story reasons, but even a brief clash with Cliff Booth was more than memorable. After all, Pitt’s role in Fight Club as Tyler Durden has been etched into pop culture for decades, and the Dune veteran admits that just sharing the screen in a fight sequence with him was a dream come true.

Now, both actors have moved forward and taken part in even more action. Austin Butler’s most recent work, Ari Aster’s neo-noir western Eddington, already hit the 2025 movie release schedule, and Caught Stealing lands in theaters on August 29th. And if you want to revisit Pitt’s iconic Fight Club, you can stream it with a Hulu subscription.