“Nope” stars Steven Yeun and Brandon Perea call the project Jordan Peele’s “most ambitious film yet,” while talking to CinemaBlend’s Eric Eisenberg. Watch as they discuss working with the acclaimed director, including “homework” they were given ahead of shooting, how they formed their characters, some of their favorite details on set and more!
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00:00 Yeah, yeah, it's been fun.
00:01 This is fucking crazy.
00:03 This is fucking crazy to me.
00:04 There's a lot to unpack.
00:05 Oh, yes.
00:06 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:07 Right here, you are going to witness
00:12 an absolute spectacle.
00:15 So what happens next?
00:16 I'm curious, did you have homework?
00:24 Did Jordan Peele give you specific reference points,
00:26 like as far as movies or books or anything?
00:28 Yeah, yeah, so before the film, I mean, I got the job right.
00:31 And there's no synopsis.
00:33 The only thing that I heard was,
00:35 this is Jordan's most ambitious film yet,
00:37 and it's going to be massive.
00:39 That's the only thing I got.
00:40 And then he texted me a couple of movies to watch.
00:43 He told me to watch Close Encounters of the Third Kind,
00:45 Jaws, Alien, No Country for Old Men,
00:49 and 2001, A Space Odyssey.
00:52 So he sends me all those films to watch.
00:54 I'm like, OK, great.
00:55 What the hell is he going to do?
00:57 I'm like, I don't know.
00:58 That's a weird concoction of films,
01:00 but I'm happy to watch them.
01:01 That's great.
01:01 And then he never told me what the movie was about.
01:04 On Christmas Day, he just sends me the script
01:06 and says, Merry Christmas.
01:07 And then I started reading.
01:08 And yeah, that's how he told me.
01:10 Nice.
01:11 Yeah.
01:12 Looking at the totality of Joop as a character,
01:15 this is a guy with considerable issues.
01:17 Like, he had a trauma in his past,
01:19 and he has clearly not really processed it.
01:21 And I'm just kind of just curious
01:23 how you just approach that aspect of the character
01:25 and the conversations you had with Jordan Peele about it.
01:27 Yeah.
01:29 Well, Jordan really opened up the door for collaboration.
01:32 You know, there was an idea of who Joop was on the page,
01:34 and then we really got to talking about him
01:36 and switched some things and altered certain backstory
01:39 things and really found a motivation for him.
01:42 I think for me, what was the most interesting
01:44 is that in the end, I feel like Joop is in all of us,
01:48 you know?
01:50 What does trauma do in your life?
01:52 What does being told who you are at a young age do to you?
01:57 And, you know, that might be in child stardom,
02:00 but it kind of is also in all of us, too.
02:02 So I thought about that a lot.
02:04 Was being a child star something that you specifically
02:07 talked about and just kind of looked into?
02:09 Yeah, you can look into it.
02:10 I think we have--
02:12 it was interesting.
02:13 When we were making the film, a lot of documentaries
02:15 were coming out about that.
02:16 And there's obviously, you know, the storied careers
02:21 that we all know.
02:22 I think for me, what I wanted to focus on the most
02:26 was really just the way in which our kind of selves
02:31 are formed.
02:32 Like, who are we?
02:33 Are we who we want us, ourselves, to be?
02:37 Or are we kind of like the sum of other people's projections
02:41 onto us?
02:42 And what does that do to your life?
02:44 And what does that do to your motivations?
02:46 And who are you in the end?
02:48 So yeah, it was a very existential, isolated exercise.
02:53 Well, I think a fascinating extension of that
02:55 is the Gordy's Home Museum that he keeps secret.
02:58 Which, I mean, Jordan Peele is so great with details.
03:01 And I'm just curious, like, going through that museum,
03:03 did you have a favorite detail?
03:06 Yeah, I mean, I think there's so many things.
03:09 The fact that, like, he holds all these, you know,
03:13 epitaphs of his time there.
03:16 The fact that he owns them still.
03:18 The fact that he has them.
03:19 Did he get it from the very beginning?
03:22 Or did he have to search for it over the years
03:24 and, like, acquire them?
03:27 It's, you know, I think even just, like,
03:30 the secret compartment of it all.
03:32 You know, there's this--
03:34 all of Jupiter's claim feels like a big fever dream.
03:37 You know, it's really interesting.
03:39 You guys want to tell me what's going on?
03:40 Hell no.
03:41 When you actually first auditioned for the role of Angel,
03:44 you actually had a different interpretation
03:45 of the character than Jordan Peele originally had,
03:47 and he ended up changing the role for you.
03:49 I'm just curious, kind of, what the role was
03:51 before you came aboard and kind of your interpretation of it.
03:54 Yeah, my-- the first thing that he wrote, I guess--
03:57 and I just found this out yesterday.
03:58 I didn't really know the details of Angel
04:00 'cause it was pretty simplified.
04:02 It was, like, it used to be named Artie,
04:05 and he was just a kid that was clutch,
04:07 something like that.
04:08 And he worked at a retail store.
04:11 So I just saw that, and then it just seemed like
04:14 this kid was kind of happy-go-lucky,
04:16 and I found out he's very nerdy,
04:17 like, very, like, super, like, nerdy
04:19 in the sense of, like, quirky nerdy.
04:21 I was like, "Oh, my gosh, I'm a tech quiz.
04:22 Da-da-da-da-da-da."
04:24 And then--so I just found that out yesterday, funny enough.
04:27 But I just never saw it that way
04:29 when I initially got the script--
04:31 or the sides, actually.
04:32 I just thought about it. I brought it to a real place.
04:35 Jordan's very good at keeping his films grounded,
04:37 and you just think those humans are alive on Earth.
04:39 So usually when I walk into a retail store,
04:41 no one wants to be there.
04:42 No one's really happy to be there.
04:44 They're kind of just like, "Yeah, what do you need?
04:46 All right, cool. Scan that. Great.
04:48 All right, you need something else?
04:50 Cool. Do it."
04:51 So I kind of just went into it with that intention,
04:54 where I'm like, "This is kind of the feel that I get."
04:56 And he thought that was so funny,
04:57 kind of this dude who's over it.
04:59 - Sure. - And, yeah,
05:01 that made him laugh quite a bit.
05:02 So I'm so glad that I entered it with that.
05:05 And I just wanted to attack it differently
05:07 than I feel like others would.
05:09 There was another spin that I did where it was just--
05:11 and a shout-out to my reader, Chibu Ken Uche,
05:13 who's also an actor.
05:14 We worked together to kind of conjure up this idea of,
05:16 like, let's speak in code or something.
05:18 Like, I'm running, like, a drug operation through crypto,
05:21 and let's just do something crazy.
05:22 So there's just this tense energy.
05:24 - Sure. - And that ended up working,
05:26 and, yeah, now I'm here today, which is crazy.
05:28 There's something out here.
05:31 Maybe you're in a UFO hot spot.
05:33 And, like, he is such a detail-oriented guy.
05:37 Like, everything in his movies is just so spectacularly layered,
05:40 and it's really what impresses me about his films.
05:42 - Yeah. - I'm curious if that was something
05:44 that influenced just kind of your character building,
05:46 and also if there was just anything
05:48 either in your character, on set, in the costuming,
05:50 that just--that you found as a detail that just blew your mind.
05:53 Yeah, I felt like--
05:55 I feel like I'm usually really detailed as an actor,
05:57 so I can relate with Jordan in that sense,
05:59 not to say that I'm on the level of Jordan Bale or another--
06:01 no, I'm not saying that. All right, yeah, so don't--
06:03 don't eat me up for that one.
06:04 But, yeah, I just felt like our--
06:07 the way that we work complemented each other
06:09 very well. I love those details.
06:11 I love hashing things out in that sense,
06:14 and we had a lot of conversations
06:15 of building this character, and, like, wardrobe was a big thing.
06:18 We were doing a lot of fittings.
06:20 Like, originally, I'd walk in,
06:22 and it was kind of like the nerdy fits,
06:23 and it was like, "Okay, this is kind of changing
06:25 the way I'd play it, though."
06:26 And then I think the producers realized that.
06:28 Shout-out to Ian Cooper as well.
06:30 He was very hands-on when it came to making sure
06:33 Angel's wardrobe was crafted
06:34 and the music I was listening to was crafted,
06:36 and that's where we kind of got this metal feel
06:39 of, like, this grungy kid that's just, um,
06:42 kind of mad at the world type of deal.
06:44 So, yeah, it was very detailed,
06:46 and I appreciate the details,
06:47 'cause that's what I'd like as a performer.
06:49 I'm serving a character, you know?
06:50 I'm not serving me. I'm serving that, so...
06:52 - And as much material as they give you,
06:53 more--all the more to work from, right?
06:55 - Yeah, exactly, exactly.
06:56 So really crafting the backstory was key for me,
06:58 'cause I'm like, "Why is he in this space?
07:00 What got him here?"
07:02 And that really crafted all the intention that I led with.
07:05 - And I am curious.
07:06 Did you guys talk about the shoe at all?
07:08 'Cause it's an interesting mystery.
07:10 - Yeah, what did you-- what did you think about the shoe?
07:12 - I honestly don't know.
07:13 Like, I have to think about it more.
07:15 But I'm curious just--yeah.
07:16 - You know, the first interview I had yesterday,
07:19 I flipped that question back on to him about the shoe,
07:21 and he said something that I was like, "Whoa."
07:23 And he was like, "I think the shoe represents
07:25 that anything is possible."
07:27 - Mm-hmm.
07:28 - And I was like, "I like that.
07:31 I like that a lot. Yeah, I'm gonna use that one."
07:33 - There you go. Nice.
07:34 - Thumbs up!
07:36 - Should I do it?
07:37 - Thumbs up! Thumbs up!
07:38 [dramatic music]
07:41 [MUSIC PLAYING]