Jonathan Nolan Opens Up About Casting for Fallout, Calls It ‘Scariest But Most Rewarding Part’

Filmmaker Jonathan Nolan, who has award-winning films like Memento, The Prestige, Interstellar, and series like Westworld a part of his decorated filmography, recently visited India to promote his upcoming series Fallout. Set to release on Prime Video, Nolan has produced the series with his wife Lisa Joy. The series is based on a popular video game of the same name. Set two hundred years after the apocalypse, the dystopian world of Fallout keeps its fans eagerly waiting.

Nolan, who helms the role of Director and Executive Producer for Fallout, recently opened up about casting for his post-apocalyptic drama. “Casting is the part of the process that I’m most excited about and it’s also the scariest, but most rewarding part of this,” Nolan revealed. “The writing, even when it’s collaborative, working with writers, that’s all very intimate, and then suddenly you open it up to casting and you wait to be surprised. We got very lucky here with Ella, Aaron, and Walton.”

Starring as the lead in the series is actress Ella Purnell, who accompanied Nolan for his India visit to promote Fallout. She shared how she landed the role of Lucy, a dynamic, capable, and slightly naive young vault dweller who leaves the comfort of her vault and ventures on the surface to a startling new world.

“I knew of the Fallout games because everybody did. My friends had played it, my brothers had played it,” says Ella Purnell of her entry point. “When I met with Jonah, Geneva, and Graham and they explained their approach to the world, the game, and then the character – she’s basically someone who would star in a toothpaste commercial but could also kill you, I was like, ‘I’m in. I am 100 percent in. Sign me up,'” she recalls with a laugh.

“They described her as a Leslie Knope/Ned Flanders-type, but with something kind of dangerous lurking there. I felt like, ‘Okay, I could do this, I could do this.’ Sometimes you just know, you kind of feel it in your body. But even so, it was such a surprise that I got the part. I couldn’t believe how lucky I got.”

In addition to Purnell, Fallout stars Walton Goggins, Aaron Moten, Kyle MacLachlan, Sarita Choudary, Michael Emerson, and Moises Arias. Nolan directed the first three episodes of the eight-episode first season. Fallout will premiere in India in English with dubs in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam, starting April 11, 2024.