Christopher Nolan Was Matt Damon’s Couples Counseling Caveat

By Emma Chance | Film | July 21, 2023 |

By Emma Chance | Film | July 21, 2023 |

In a recent “Around the Table” discussion for Entertainment Weekly with his Oppenheimer cast, Matt Damon admitted that before filming the movie he’d promised his wife, in the confines of their couple’s counseling, that he would go on a brief acting hiatus.

“This is going to sound made up, but it’s actually true, I had, uh, not to get too personal but, had negotiated extensively with my wife, that I was taking time off,” Damon admitted.

But, there was a small caveat. If Christopher Nolan came calling, the deal was off.

“I had been in Interstellar, and then Chris put me on ice for a couple of movies, so I wasn’t in the rotation. But I actually negotiated in couples therapy—this is a true story—that one caveat to my taking time off was if Chris Nolan called. This is without knowing whether or not he was working on anything because he never tells you. He just calls you out of the blue. And so, it was a moment in my household.”

The revelation came during a conversation about how the Oppenheimer actors were offered their roles in the movie.

“Mine was a slower courtship process because he knew I was gonna say yes no matter what,” Robert Downey Jr. said.

“Chris’s way of operating is that he just calls you out of the blue,” Cillian Murphy added.

Emily Blunt explained that she didn’t know Nolan’s process or if he was auditioning other people for her part, so when it was casually offered to her it was “so heart racing, so, so awesome.”

Basically, this is a video in which top Hollywood folks play exactly the roles we expect of them. Emily Blunt is the wisecracking charmer, Robert Downey Jr. is that but an American male, Cillian Murphy is quietly mysterious, Christopher Nolan mumbles a bunch of filmy stuff, and Matt Damon, ever the everyman, ends up sharing a little too much.