MR. NOLAN GOES TO WASHINGTON
Director did homework in choosing star for thriller
To John David Washington, it was just lunch. For two-and-ahalf hours, he and Christopher Nolan “shared our love for family and barbecues,” and not once did the famed writer-director mention the time-bending plot to Tenet, his sci-fi action thriller, or possibly casting Washington as the film’s lead.
“I don’t even know how you would pitch something like this to be honest,” Washington, 36, says during a Zoom call from Los Angeles. “We had a meeting. It turned out to be a ‘get to know you’ meeting.”
It was only afterward that Washington, who pivoted from a promising NFL career to follow his father Denzel’s path in front of the camera, learned it was an audition of sorts to lead Nolan’s latest cinematic mind trip.
“It was later that I found out I did get the job. After that I read the script, and then we discussed it, and I flooded him with questions,” Washington recalls.
In Tenet, Washington plays The Protagonist, a government agent who is recruited into a shadowy spy world to stop World War III. The film is a high concept espionage thriller that leans heavily into science fiction, with time-inversion — a process by which a person or object can move backward — at its heart.
Shot in 70-millimetre Imax, Nolan’s globe-trotting mystery also stars Robert Pattinson and Elizabeth Debicki, with Kenneth Branagh as the film’s scene-stealing villain.
After an injury sidelined his dreams of being a football star (he was signed in 2006 by the
St. Louis Rams), Washington, who had acted in bit parts in his father’s early films, including Malcolm X and Devil in a Blue Dress, lined up his first full-time acting gig in HBO’S Ballers alongside Dwayne Johnson.
His Golden Globe-nominated role in Spike Lee’s Blackkklansman helped put him on Nolan’s radar leading to the part he calls “a role of a lifetime.”
In fact for Washington, who politely eschews any talk of his famous dad, the head-scratcher still isn’t Tenet’s cerebral plot, it’s the fact that with only a handful of film credits to his name, he was asked to star. “A lot of times it just felt so unbelievable, and by that I mean me starring in a Christopher Nolan film. I couldn’t believe that was real.”
Nolan has done a great job of taking these genre films and then filling them with big ideas.
Q What did you think about the concept of time inversion?
A As soon as I got out of the theatre it’s the first thing I Googled. The way Chris described it, and how it’s portrayed in the film, it definitely seems possible. But it’s a hard concept to wrap your head around ... But the experience of training for two-and-a-half months, learning these forward and backward fighting moves, helped me grasp the concept a little more.
Q It’s a huge movie with intricate action scenes. What was the hardest sequence to film?
A It was hard for me to land on the background artists in the opera house siege and crawl all over them to get across the aisle and down the stairway. That was tough. The concept of walking on people while they’re pretending to be passed out was hard for me. A lot of the stuff you see near the end, with all that gear and running, it’s a paintballer’s dream I’m sure, but it was intense. A lot of it was hard.
Q What was easy?
A There’s a scene where I have to wake up. That was as easy as it got.
Q There are some huge stunts. Which was your favourite?
A All the hand-to-hand combat sequences I love … I’m proud of the fight scenes because they’ve never been done before. The film takes on a different personality in the last 45 minutes, and some of those scenes are among my favourites, as well.
Q With so many other films skipping their theatrical releases, what does it mean to you to see Tenet being released into theatres?
A I’m so proud of everybody involved, for Christopher Nolan being who he is and believing in it, and Warner Bros. for supporting him. It’s encouraging to know — exciting to know — that people will get to see this the way it’s supposed to be. It will be a great reminder of why we need the cinema and why we need movies.
Q There are already a lot of fan theories trying to decode Tenet. Some people think this is a sequel to Inception. Is it?
A We’ve been wanting a sequel to Inception for so long, but I’m sorry to disappoint the fan theories out there: this is not a sequel to Inception. This is a whole other idea.
Q What’s your favourite Chris Nolan film?
A That’s like asking what’s your favourite soul food spot. I can’t answer that, man. It depends on the month, it depends on what I’m going through. But I’m going to say Tenet.