Christopher Nolan on Casting Travis Scott in The Odyssey and Why Rap Fits the Story

Christopher Nolan has explained why Travis Scott ended up in The Odyssey, the director’s forthcoming adaptation of Homer’s epic Greek poem.

The film is led by Matt Damon as Odysseus, with Tom Holland playing Telemachus, Odysseus’ son. Anne Hathaway, Zendaya, Lupita Nyong’o, Robert Pattinson, Charlize Theron, Benny Safdie, Elliot Page, Samantha Morton and Mia Goth are also set to appear in the all-star cast.

Scott’s role first surfaced in January, when a teaser trailer showed Holland’s Telemachus being interrupted by the rapper in a crowded hall. He quiets the room and speaks of war with a blunt warning: “A war, a man, a trick – a trick to break the walls of Troy,” before the trailer cuts to images of the Trojan War. “It burning, screaming to the ground.”

Now Nolan has addressed the casting in a new interview with Time, tying Scott’s presence directly to the poem’s ancient roots.

“I cast him because I wanted to nod towards the idea that this story has been handed down as oral poetry, which is analogous to rap,” the director said.

It is not the first time Nolan and Scott have crossed paths. In 2020, Scott recorded “The Plan” for Nolan’s Tenet, and the director was already speaking about him in glowing terms around that period. In an interview with GQ, Nolan said, “His voice became the final piece of a yearlong puzzle,” adding, “His insights into the musical and narrative mechanism [composer] Ludwig Göransson and I were building were immediate, insightful and profound.”

Earlier this month, a full trailer for The Odyssey arrived, leaning into the film’s scale with epic action and that same stacked ensemble. You can view it above.

The film is due out on July 17, 2026. Tickets for some IMAX 70mm screenings, Nolan’s preferred format, went on sale 12 months early and sold out within an hour.