Oppenheimer: Christopher Nolan reveals ‘honeymoon in Kyoto’ line was improvised by this actor on set

Maverick filmmaker Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, which recently released at the box office, has turned out to be a global winner. The biographical drama based on the life of the American theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, has garnered praises for its screenplay, direction, camerawork, soundtrack and impeccable performances of the ensemble. While the film continues to rake in moolah across the globe, in a recent interview with The New York Times, the director revealed that there was a line, which was tweaked at the last minute and surprised everyone on the set when it made it to the final cut.

In a scene, where Oppenheimer is in a crucial meeting with the U.S. Secretary of War, Henry Stimson and other government officials, where they decide on which part of Japan they need to drop bombs. Followed by a scene, where Henry says they should avoid Kyoto as it is a place he and his wife went on a honeymoon. “There’s a moment where James Remar… He kept talking to me about how he learned that Stimson and his wife had honeymooned in Kyoto. That was one of the reasons that Stimson took Kyoto off the list to be bombed. I had him crossing the city off the list because of its cultural significance, but I’m like, ‘Just add that.’ It’s a fantastically exciting moment where no one in the room knows how to react,” said Nolan. Talking about actors researching on their characters, he added, “They had tons of homework to do. They had a great resource with ‘American Prometheus.’ They then did their own research and what it meant for me, which isn’t something I’d ever really been able to do in the past… The script is there, but they could come into it with passion and knowledge based on all of their own learning.”