Christopher Nolan's ‘Oppenheimer’ features real scientists as extras

 After a three-year hiatus Christopher Nolan is back with Oppenheimer, which, according to preliminary viewings is on its way to become another Nolan blockbuster.

The Cillian Murphy starrer revolves around the creator of the atomic bomb, Robert Oppenheimer. Nolan and Murphy spoke to Entertainment Weekly about the painstaking efforts made by the director and cast to ensure each scene comes out as aesthetically intended.

“Every day, you had these phenomenal actors, who are heroes of mine, coming in,” Murphy said.

“Every day, you were having to raise your game to work with these legends. Everybody was so unbelievably well-prepared. Every single actor, no matter what size their role or the significance of their character in history, each one of them had this massive depth of knowledge that they could draw on.”

What’s more? Christopher Nolan revealed that even the film's extras were thoroughly knowledgeable in the source material as he intentionally cast scientists as background actors.

“We were in the real Los Alamos and we had a lot of real scientists as extras,” Nolan said. “We needed the crowd of extras to give reactions, and improvise, and we were getting sort of impromptu, very educated speeches. It was really fun to listen to. You’ve been on sets where you’ve got a lot of extras around and they’re more or less thinking about lunch. These guys were thinking about the geopolitical implications of nuclear arms and knew a lot about it. It actually was a great reminder every day of: We have to be really on our game, we have to be faithful to the history here, and really know what we’re up to.”

Oppenheimer will be released by Universal Pictures on Friday, July 21.