Christopher Nolan's 'Tenet' Recruits 'Yesterday' Star Himesh Patel

Yesterday, British actor Himesh Patel was just the star of Danny Boyle's Beatles-inspired summer movie, Yesterday. Today, Patel is the latest addition to Christopher Nolan's Tenet cast. This guy's star is clearly on the rise, but as you might expect, details about his role in Nolan's new action film are being kept secret. Here's what we do know about the movie so far.

Variety reports that Patel has "nabbed one of the last roles in the film," which has been shooting for months already and is a globe-spanning production that will ultimately film in seven countries across the world. The movie is "an action epic evolving from the world of international espionage," and John David Washington (Black Klansman) leads a stellar cast which also includes Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Dimple Kapadia, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Clémence Poésy, Michael Caine, and Kenneth Branagh.

Now Patel is on board too, and it'll be interesting to see him go from a mostly happy-go-lucky, musical romantic comedy to a stone-faced, spy-centric action thriller. Patel has already proven he can fill out a nice suit with the best of 'em (ask James Bond: nailing the look is half the battle in globe-trotting spy films), and I think even Yesterday's biggest detractors came away from that film thinking that Patel is a charismatic, promising young performer. Given that Nolan filled out his Dunkirk cast with several unfamiliar faces and handed out chances for scrappy young actors to make a name for themselves, it seems as if he's doing something similar with Patel here.

A short, mysterious teaser trailer for Tenet made a splash by surprise premiering in front of theatrical screenings of Hobbs and Shaw several weeks ago, but that teaser still hasn't made its way online. At this point, the buzz about it has died off completely, so I wouldn't be surprised if Warner Bros. never released it online and instead chose to debut a fuller trailer which gives fans a bit more to chew on.

Nolan, who also wrote the screenplay, is reportedly shooting the movie with a mix of IMAX and 70mm film. He's reuniting with his Interstellar cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema, longtime production designer Nathan Crowley, and frequent costume designer Jeffrey Kurland here, but he'll be working with editor Jennifer Lame and composer Ludwig Göransson for the first time.

Tenet hits theaters on July 17, 2020.