Cillian Murphy says Oppenheimer is ‘the best script I ever read’

As film fans gear up for the anticipated release of Oppenheimer this summer, Cillian Murphy has given Christopher Nolan’s latest quite the ringing endorsement.

“I think it’s the best script I ever read,” he simply put it, in his cover interview for the latest issue of Rolling Stone UK.

Murphy plays J. Robert Oppenheimer in the forthcoming biographical film, which charts the story of how the theoretical physicist developed the world’s first nuclear bombs that were dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.

Murphy also discussed how Nolan gave him the script written entirely in the first person – with the actor immediately querying such a move.

“He wanted it to be solely from Oppenheimer’s perspective. And I think the film is sensational. As a person who loves films — I’m not saying it ’cos I’m in the fucking thing, I hate looking at myself —  but as a lover of film, as a cinephile, I’m a Chris Nolan fan,” the Irish actor said.

Nolan himself also hailed Murphy’s depiction of the controversial physicist.

“His ability to project power applies in a completely different way to a character like Oppenheimer, because Oppenheimer is this extraordinary strategic brain,” said Nolan. “There are all these levels of intention that are going on with the actions he’s taking, and he’s surrounded by people. So, the audience becomes members of this community who are hanging on to his every word, studying his every gesture, to try and understand it.”

Offering some hints to his characterisation of Oppenheimer, Murphy added: “With that intellect — which I think can actually be a burden — you’re not seeing stuff in the normal plane that we do. Everything is multifaceted and about to collapse. It’d be a terrible way to buy milk or cut the grass, I’d say.”

Taken from issue 11 of Rolling Stone UK, out May 11. Buy your copy here. Oppenheimer is released 21 July.