Florence Pugh says Oppenheimer director Christopher Nolan apologised to her over role

This summer, there were two movies that had even the most fair-weather film watchers heading to the cinema. 

Greta Gerwig's Barbie and Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer were released on 21st July, and it seemed as though everyone was heading to the nearest silver screen.

While Barbie boasted an enormous roster of famous faces, Oppenheimer had fewer key players - but the actors involved are undeniably some of Hollywood's elite. With Cillian Murphy, Matt Damon, Rami Malek and Kenneth Branagh in the mix, it's unsurprising that film buffs across the globe were eager to see Nolan's latest offering. 

However, since the movie's release, many noted that the female characters - Florence Pugh's Jean Tatlock and Emily Blunt's Katherine Oppenheimer - didn't get much air time as their male counterparts. One feminist academic took to social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, to share her disappointment that 'no women speak until 20 minutes in'. 

But in a resurfaced interview with MTV, Florence Pugh has touched on the leading ladies' smaller roles and revealed that Nolan 'apologised' for their size before she had even seen the script. 

In clips from the interview, which took place ahead of Oppenheimer's release last month, Florence says: "I didn't really know what was going on or what was being made but Chris really, really wanted me to know that it wasn't a very big role and he understands if I don't want to come near it.

"And I was like: 'Doesn't matter, even if I'm a coffee maker at a café in the back of the room let's do it.'"

She continued: "We met for a drink in New York at the time... and it was just one of those bizarre moments in your career where you're like: 'I'm meeting Christopher Nolan, oh my god.' 

"And I remember he apologised about the size of the role and I was like: 'Please don't apologise!'"

Florence also said that the director wanted her to see the script before she made a decision, calling it 'the sizing thing', but that she had already made her mind up.

She added: "He said: 'We'll send you the script and honestly you just read it and you decide if it's right, I completely understand the sizing thing.' 

"And I remember that evening when I got the script being like: 'I know I'm going to do it.' And yeah, it was huge."