Robert Downey Jr auditioned for Batman Begins, but Christopher Nolan knew he wasn’t the guy: ‘I was selfish’

Christopher Nolan admitted that he was selfish to call Robert Downey Jr for the audition because he always wanted to meet the actor. “I was a huge admirer of yours and therefore selfishly just wanted to take the meeting. But I was also a little afraid of you, you know. I had heard all kinds of stories about how you were crazy. It was only a few years after the last of those stories that had come out about you.”

Nolan also opened up about how unrecognizable Robert Downey was in Oppenheimer as Lewis Strauss. “One of the first few times we showed the film, I was talking to a young guy afterward who had no idea Robert was in it. That’s when I knew that you had completely just lost yourself in this character.” However, that made the filmmaker wonder how he is going to sell the movie with such a conundrum. Nolan added that it was not the intention to make the actor unrecognizable. Downey remarked, “Though you did say you’d like to remove the handsome. And I was like, Christopher Nolan thinks I’m handsome!”

Talking about the 13 Oscar nominations, Christopher Nolan admitted that winning it would be a dream-come-true moment for him as he grew up watching the award ceremony.