Director, writer, and producer Jonathan Nolan opens up his archive to L&rsquo;OFFICIEL and discusses the fascination with time that is so prevalent in his work, from Fallout to Westworld to Interstellar.

The phonograph record sitting on a shelf in Jonathan Nolan's <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/art/frieze-los-angeles-2024-guide-exhibits-parties-events">Los Angeles</a> office is a reminder. The cylinder-shaped record, a device for playing music that predates the flat round vinyl record, serves to help Nolan recall where he came from, where he&rsquo;s been, and where he can go, as a person and storyteller. Nolan&rsquo;s <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/film-tv/oscars-2024-all-the-winners-full-list">Oscar</a>- and <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion/best-looks-2024-emmys-red-carpet-celebrities-selena-gomez-jeremy-allen-white">Emmy</a>-nominated body of work&mdash;including Amazon&rsquo;s Fallout, HBO&rsquo;s Westworld, and the film Interstellar (which he cowrote with his brother, <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/film-tv/zoe-kravitz-lost-audition-for-christopher-nolan-the-dark-night-rises-batman-racism">Christopher Nolan</a>, and which celebrates its tenth anniversary this month)&mdash;has come to define modern sci-fi. "We haven't done anything on a modest scale in quite some time," he says with a laugh. The phonograph record was used as a prop in the Season 1 finale of Westworld. "It looks like a twist on something familiar&hellip; or taking a familiar object and making it feel just a little bit distant, a little bit strange."

Nolan’s phonograph record, photo by Jonathan Nolan

The record, containing the music of Polish composer Fr&eacute;d&eacute;ric Chopin, dates back to his father and noted Chopin fan, Brendan Nolan, who worked as a copywriter on accounts including Guinness and Cadbury Chocolate. Brendan always had dreams of writing for television. On a work trip to Los Angeles in the 1960s, Brendan met a producer for the sitcom The Monkees at a hotel bar, who advised him to write a spec script and send it to him. He did, but the spec script&mdash;which included a scene in which The Monkees, a pop rock band and lighthearted American answer to <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/music/young-john-lennon-photos-beatles-yoko-ono">The Beatles</a>, encounter a phonograph record, a relic of the past, on the <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion/the-best-beach-bags-for-summer-holidays">beach</a>&mdash;was returned by mail with a note saying that the producer had died. So, the senior Nolan&rsquo;s dream of writing for television was never realized. "We put the cylindrical record in Westworld's first season finale as a little bit of an homage to my dad," he says. By the time Jonathan Nolan began writing for television, his father had already passed away.&nbsp;
The passage of time, memory, and links to the past have always been major themes in Nolan&rsquo;s work (Memento, The Prestige, and The Dark Knight trilogy, to name a few). "Time is really the thing that separates us most," he says. "We're stranded not just in space, but in our little moment with the people who came before us&hellip; our parents, our grandparents. If we're lucky enough, we get to know those people a little bit, but eventually they have to go and you're on your own. And you get a glimpse of your children and a chance to connect to them. And then it's your turn."

Portrait of Jonathan Nolan by John P. Johnson

L'LOOKBACK: How Jonathan Nolan Freezes Time

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