In a recent Entertainment Weekly ‘Around the Table’ chat, ‘Inception’ director Christopher Nolan sat down with his latest movie ‘Oppenheimer’ stars Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, and Robert Downey Jr. During the conversation, Nolan explained how Sting unknowingly influenced the film; he said:
“I first heard about ‘Oppenheimer’ when I was a kid. That Sting song ‘Russians’ refers to ‘Oppenheimer’s ‘deadly toys.'”
Nolan recalled his childhood and the fear of a ‘nuclear war.’ He added:
“I was growing up in the U.K. at a time when people were very concerned about nuclear armaments. When I was 12 or 13, my friends and I were absolutely convinced that we were going to experience a nuclear war at some point in our lives. Oppenheimer stuck with me as a figure, and I learned more about him over the years.”
Apparently ‘Oppenheimer’ is based on Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book ‘American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer,’ which further helped Nolan make the movie.
When Nolan talked about what he took away from the book during their ‘Around the Table’ chat, the director expressed:
“One of the first things I grabbed hold of from the book, as I was reading it the first time, you realize that Los Alamos, which would become so important in history, is just this place [where] he and his brother liked to go camping. That connection, the personal with the historical, I thought was really engaging.”
You can watch EW’s ‘Around the Table’ conversation and the ‘Oppenheimer’ trailer and listen to ‘Russians’ below.
