Benny Safdie proudly embraced bushy eyebrows for his role as Hungarian-American physicist Edward Teller in Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster, ‘Oppenheimer.’
The director encouraged him not to pluck his brows, allowing him to resemble his character more authentically. Safdie revealed, “I am proud to say that it’s all my eyebrows. Teller had the best eyebrows. Every once in a while I have a straggler that I’ll just pluck out, cause it looks a little too crazy. But Chris said, ‘Don’t do that. Let’s just let it go crazy.’
I had the most insane eyebrows for months and months, and you just had to brush them out and then they shined in all their glory.”
While Safdie successfully embraced the look, he also faced the challenge of mastering Teller’s thick Hungarian accent. He recalled being nervous about it but eventually found his way through a collaborative process with Nolan.
Safdie expressed, “I remember finally I was like, ‘You know what? I could sound crazy, but I don’t care. This is what Teller sounds like and I’m just going to do it.’ I sent a voice memo where I just narrated what my breakfast was and how Teller really liked pineapple.”