Christopher Nolan is famed for assembling star-studded casts for every one of his features, but looking at how things are going so far, the ensemble for Oppenheimer could well end up being his most stacked yet.
As per Deadline, the biographic drama revolving around the father of the atomic bomb has added Robert Downey Jr. and Matt Damon, who will join Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer and Emily Blunt as his wife Katherine Oppenheimer Vissering, while you’d imagine there’s a role in there for Michael Caine somewhere now that we know he isn’t retiring from acting.
There’s no word yet on who either of the A-list new recruits are playing, but the thought of Robert Downey Jr. in a Christopher Nolan movie is enough to get anybody excited. The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s former Iron Man is looking to distance himself from his decade-long tenure as the superhero, and this is the latest high-profile project on his docket alongside HBO’s The Sympathizer, where he’ll play multiple roles.
Damon of course made a surprise cameo in Nolan’s Interstellar so he’s familiar with the filmmaker, and we should be getting more casting news soon with production expected to begin on Oppenheimer early next year with a July 21, 2023 release date and 100-day theatrical window already locked in.