While Other ‘Odyssey’ Stars Were Struggling, Elliot Page Had One Very Canadian Advantage on Set

Elliot Page has been relatively quiet about his experience on the set of Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey — but when he did open up about it, the reason he handled the brutal conditions better than most of his co-stars turned out to be surprisingly straightforward.

Speaking to Desi Lydic on The Daily Show on July 23, Page reflected on what filming the epic was actually like from his perspective, according to PinkNews. His co-stars have spent weeks describing the production as one of the most physically demanding shoots they’ve ever experienced — Matt Damon talked about being cold, wet, and exhausted for months on end, while Zendaya’s mouth literally froze in Iceland. Lydic asked Page directly whether the experience was as grueling as everyone was making it sound.

The Canadian Secret

Page was candid about the fact that his experience was considerably less punishing than what the core cast endured — largely because of when he worked. He joined the production early on during the shoot, left, and then returned later when things were in full swing. By the time he came back, he said he genuinely couldn’t comprehend how everyone around him was still upright and functioning after everything they’d been through.

The weather and temperature were the biggest challenges he personally faced — but here, Page said he had what amounted to a natural advantage over his international co-stars. Having grown up working as a child actor in Canada, he said he was simply used to operating in genuinely brutal outdoor conditions. Cold, rain, wind — none of it was unfamiliar territory.

It was a quiet, self-deprecating acknowledgment that while he was glad to be part of the film, the hardest parts of production largely fell to other people.

Playing a Character Who Isn’t in the Original

Page plays Sinon in the film — and he was open about the fact that Sinon does not appear in Homer’s original Odyssey. The character was created specifically for Nolan’s adaptation, which gave Page both creative freedom and a specific kind of pressure. With no established literary template to draw from, the focus became entirely about using the limited screen time available to make the character feel real and purposeful within the broader story.

He described his conversations with Nolan about Sinon as centering on the character’s role as a kind of moral consciousness — someone confronting Odysseus and the wider impacts and brutality of war. For Page, the primary emotion going into filming was a very specific kind of terror: the good kind, driven by a genuine desire not to let the director down.

The Backlash That Nolan Dismissed

Page’s casting in the film attracted criticism from certain corners of social media ahead of release, with some right-wing commentators taking issue with a trans actor’s involvement in a Greek mythology adaptation. Nolan addressed the backlash directly in comments to Variety, dismissing it as entirely irrelevant on the grounds that nobody criticizing the casting had any idea what the actual film was yet.

The Odyssey is currently in theaters.