"Oppenheimer" Cast Leaves UK Premiere as SAG-AFTRA Strike Imminent

The “Oppenheimer” cast planned their strike strategy before hitting the movie’s red carpet premiere in London on Thursday.

The London carpet for Nolan’s atomic bomb thriller kicked off just before 5 p.m. local time, with a lot of nervous publicists and marketing executives looking anxiously at their phones and watches.

In the event of an early strike, sources told Variety that the cast planned to discreetly exit the carpet in Leicester Square.

The cast worked the carpet for the better part of an hour before wrapping around 6 p.m. for group photos. Rami Malek, who was stuck in traffic heading over to central London from a shoot, missed the red carpet entirely, but arrived at the 11th hour and hurried onto the carpet for photos.

The cast was expected to attend screenings of the movie following the red carpet, but instead left the event in support of the actors' strike. 

Christopher Nolan confirmed before the beginning of the screening that the cast has left in solidarity with the SAG-AFTRA strike.

“We talked about it.  Look, if it’s called now, everyone’s going to walk obviously in solidarity … Once the strike is officially called, [we’re walking]. That’s why we moved this [red carpet] up because we know the second it’s called, we’re going home," Matt Damon told Variety.

Damon added: “We gave the strike authorization. We voted 98% to 2% to do that because we know our leadership has our best interest at heart.”

“It’s really about working actors,” he continued. “It’s $26,000 to qualify for health coverage and a lot of people are on the margins and residual payments are getting them across that threshold. This isn’t an academic exercise. This is real-life and death stuff. Hopefully, we get to a resolution quickly. No one wants a work stoppage, but we’ve got to get a fair deal.”

“Obviously we stand with all of the actors and at whatever point it’s called, we’re going to be going home and standing together through it because I want everyone to get a fair deal,” Emily Blunt told the outlet.

Asked whether she’ll be joining the picket line herself, the British star quipped, “Oh, I think so!” before being rushed down the line by her publicist.

Kenneth Branagh, who plays physicist Niels Bohr in the film, also spoke to Variety about his feelings about the strike.

“There are a lot of people here we did not want to disappoint, but we’re also in complete solidarity with our colleagues and what they’re doing,” he said.

“I know they’ve worked diligently to achieve an agreement which is happening at a critical point in our industry. It’s important that we’re ready to be shoulder-to-shoulder with them as the situation develops.”

Universal held two separate screenings for “Oppenheimer” — one in Leicester Square and another at BFI Imax in Waterloo. Nolan attended the Leicester Square premiere first, where he revealed the cast had left in support of the strike, and then headed to the BFI venue, where he made the same speech to the audience.