Dennis Christopher joins 'Django Unchained'

By Adnan Tezer Sep 30, 2011, 18:59 GMT

Dennis Christopher is in talks to join the cast of Quentin Tarantino's new film "Django Unchained."

According to Variety, Tarantino will direct from his own screenplay.

The film will be a spaghetti Western set during the Old South that centers on a slave named Django who teams with a German bounty hunter named Dr. King Schultz to rescue his slave wife from an evil plantation owner named Calvin Candie.

Jamie Foxx will play Django.

Christoph Waltz, who won an Oscar for his role in Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds," will play Schultz.

Leonardo DiCaprio will play the sadistic Candie, the owner of a Mississippi plantation called Candyland. Candie forces his male slaves to engage in fights to the death while sexually abusing his female slaves.

Kevin Costner will play Candie's equally sadistic slave trainer.

Samuel L. Jackson will play Candie's main slave.

Gerald McRaney has also been cast.

The Weinstein Company will distribute the film domestically while Sony Pictures will distribute overseas.

Stacey Sher, Pilar Savone and Reginald Hudlin are producing.

Production begins in November with a Christmas Day 2012 release date set.

Christopher is best known for his role in "Breaking Away" in 1979.

He was last seen on the big screen in Henry Jaglom's "Queen of the Lot" in 2010.