OPPENHEIMER - 'IT'S BEEN A WILD RIDE'

A ROLL CALL OF HOLLYWOOD’S BIGGEST NAMES STAR IN CHRISTOPHER NOLAN’S EPIC DRAMA

Without a doubt, Oppenheimer has been one of the most anticipated movies of the year, thanks to its genius director Christopher Nolan and stellar cast. Cillian Murphy plays the divisive “Father of the Atomic Bomb”, J. Robert Oppenheimer, the US physicist who played a key role in developing the World War II-ending nuclear weapons dropped over Japan’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Emily Blunt takes on the role of his biologist wife, Kitty, Matt Damon is major player General Leslie Groves Jr., and Robert Downey Jr. plays Lewis Strauss, a founding commissioner of the US Atomic Energy Commission. The stars, who were also joined on-screen by Florence Pugh as psychiatrist Jean Tatlock, sat down to talk about bringing Oppenheimer’s story to life on film…

How did you get involved with the project? 

Cillian Murphy: Honestly, it came out of the blue. That is the way Chris [Nolan] operates – I’ve never known when he’s going to call. He flew to Ireland, gave me the script. I sat in his hotel room, read it for three hours, and it was one of the best scripts I’d ever read. I knew it was a huge undertaking. But, of course, when it’s Chris, you just say, “Yes”.

Robert Downey Jr.: I have lived under the shadow of having never been called by Chris Nolan to be in a movie [laughs]. And here we are today … these are all people that I’ve wanted to work with as long as I can remember. It’s been a wild ride.