Actor Brandon Perea (The OA) had no idea he was auditioning for a role in the sci-fi/horror-comedy Nope when he read for a character that was described to him as “clutch.” The only thing he was told was that the role was for a Jordan Peele movie. Knowing that, Perea was immediately sold.
“I was like, ‘Oh, I’ll do whatever Jordan wants me to do,’” Perea, 27, told Remezcla during a recent interview. “I’ll play [a] balloon or [a] couch. I don’t care.”
After he landed the role, Perea still wasn’t told what the movie was about. Instead, Peele gave him a list of films he wanted him to screen on his own. These included Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Jaws, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Alien, and No Country for Old Men.
“I was like, ‘That’s a weird mixture of movies, my man, but I’ll watch them and see what’s up,’” said Perea, who is half Puerto Rican and half Filipino. “Then, a month and a half goes by, and Jordan texts me and says, ‘Merry Christmas,’ and sends me the script.”
In Nope, Perea plays Angel Torres, an employee at an electronics store who is hired to set up a set of surveillance cameras on a ranch owned by OJ and Emerald Haywood (Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer). The brother and sister tandem believe a UFO is lurking in the clouds above their property and want to capture it on video.
However, instead of simply connecting the cameras and leaving, Angel also gets caught up in what might be out there. So, he hangs around and helps with a possibly groundbreaking discovery.
Peele was a sort of cinematic discovery himself when he hit the public consciousness with his Academy Award-winning debut film Get Out in 2017, followed by Us two years later. The horror genre took a different turn with Peele’s high-concept and socially relevant narratives. Perea said Peele has raised the bar and crafted a style that inspires other filmmakers.
“I think [Jordan’s films] are making the genre grow more for bigger audiences,” he said. “With Nope, there’s a million different metaphors and messages that the audience can absorb for themselves. I think what Jordan has done is special.”
For Perea, that includes Peele casting a diverse group of actors in the film. He said he first felt how impactful that was for him when he saw his character poster and one of the movie’s billboards in Los Angeles.
“It was a very emotional moment,” he said. “It represented so much for me. To see a diverse cast in a spectacle film all on one poster, I just felt so much power and pride. I feel very privileged to be a part of this big picture. I hope people are inspired by it to create more spectacle stories with diverse leads.”
So, what’s next for Perea? There’s nothing on his radar that’s of the same magnitude as Nope just yet, but he looks forward to that changing once the film debuts. In fact, there’s one specific franchise he wouldn’t mind being a part of in the future.
“Marvel Cinematic Universe – I need to be there,” he said. “I hope my performance in Nope proves that I can play a Marvel superhero. That’s what I want in my career – 100 percent.”
Nope premieres at theaters on July 22, 2022.