At the moment I'm doing this space movie, so I'm obsessed with

Host:
The studio lights burned low over the wide, open set — an empty hangar turned into a galaxy.
Half-constructed planets hung from wires, LED stars blinked lazily against a curtain of black velvet, and a distant fan hummed — the illusion of space breathing.

It was long after shooting hours. The cameras slept. The crew had gone home. Only the quiet hum of electric air and the faint scent of coffee lingered.

Jack stood at the edge of the set, still wearing part of his astronaut costume — the collar undone, the helmet tucked under one arm. His grey eyes stared at the artificial stars with that mixture of irony and awe he reserved for both art and truth.

Across the soundstage, Jeeny sat on a folding chair, flipping through the day’s script pages, her brown eyes following the words but thinking beyond them. The glow from her tablet reflected like distant constellations across her face.

She looked up, smiling with quiet mischief, and read the line that had been circling her thoughts all evening:

"At the moment I'm doing this space movie, so I'm obsessed with physics and space travel. I know three months down the line it's gone. Then I'll be able to superficially say stuff about space." — Cillian Murphy

Jeeny:
(smiling softly)
Isn’t that the most honest thing an actor’s ever said?

Jack:
(grinning faintly)
Honest? It’s practically confession.

Jeeny:
(laughs)
Exactly. He’s saying it — the truth that most people avoid: we fall in love with things only long enough to sound intelligent about them.

Jack:
Yeah. Obsession as costume.

Jeeny:
But isn’t that beautiful too? That we can fall so hard, even temporarily, for something we don’t fully understand?

Jack:
Maybe. But it’s a kind of betrayal too. Falling in love with an idea only to abandon it when the role ends.

Jeeny:
That’s every passion, Jack — every phase, every curiosity. We all live on borrowed fascinations.

Jack:
And call it identity.

Jeeny:
(smiling)
Exactly.

Host:
The studio lights dimmed further, leaving only the glow of the faux cosmos around them. Dust motes drifted through the beams like fragments of forgotten planets. There was something humbling about it — a reminder that the universe, even in imitation, dwarfs every human ego.

Jack:
You know, I kind of respect that he admits the superficiality.

Jeeny:
Because most people pretend their interests are permanent?

Jack:
Yeah. Like they’re curators of knowledge instead of tourists.

Jeeny:
(chuckling)
Tourists of the mind — I like that.

Jack:
We travel through ideas, take photos, buy a souvenir of intellect, then move on.

Jeeny:
But doesn’t that still count for something? Even tourists see beauty.

Jack:
Sure. But they don’t live it.

Jeeny:
Maybe they can’t. Maybe the mind’s not meant to stay anywhere too long.

Jack:
Or maybe we’ve just lost our capacity for depth.

Jeeny:
(sighing)
Maybe depth’s overrated. You can drown in it too.

Host:
A projector flickered to life suddenly — an image of Saturn’s rings appeared on the far wall, enormous and luminous. The illusion washed across their faces like divine geometry.

Jeeny:
You ever get that feeling — when you’re obsessed with something new, it becomes your whole world for a while?

Jack:
All the time. Philosophy, music, old films — I devour them until there’s nothing left. Then I move on, feeling guilty for abandoning them.

Jeeny:
So you know what he means.

Jack:
Yeah. Passion with an expiration date.

Jeeny:
But it’s still real while it lasts.

Jack:
That’s what makes it worse — the sincerity of temporary devotion.

Jeeny:
(smiling faintly)
So you want permanence?

Jack:
I want to believe there’s something we can love without losing interest.

Jeeny:
(softly)
Maybe that’s not love, Jack. Maybe that’s possession.

Jack:
(pauses)
And obsession’s just possession pretending to be curiosity.

Jeeny:
Exactly.

Host:
The projected image shifted — Saturn faded into a swirling galaxy, a sea of light. The room looked infinite for a moment, as though they were floating in it. Their reflections glowed faintly in the glass of a dark monitor, two figures small against the cosmos they were trying to understand.

Jeeny:
What I love about what he said — it’s not cynicism. It’s humility.

Jack:
How so?

Jeeny:
He’s admitting what most people deny — that knowledge is temporary, that wonder has seasons.

Jack:
That we orbit understanding but never land on it.

Jeeny:
Exactly. And maybe that’s okay. Maybe we’re meant to touch ideas, not own them.

Jack:
(quietly)
Like stars — too bright to hold.

Jeeny:
Yes. We pretend to study them, but really we’re just staring at light that died millions of years ago, pretending it’s still alive.

Jack:
(smiling softly)
That’s the perfect metaphor for human learning — mistaking memory for discovery.

Jeeny:
And mistaking fascination for faith.

Host:
A low rumble of thunder echoed in the distance, almost blending with the sound of the film equipment. Outside, the sky glowed faintly — not from stars, but from the restless lights of the city beyond.

Jack:
You know, actors like him — they live through borrowed lives. Maybe that’s the truest version of humanity: temporary immersion.

Jeeny:
Yes. Maybe we’re all just acting through our own curiosities — playing roles until they no longer fit.

Jack:
And when they end, we look back at our obsessions like old sets — beautiful, artificial, abandoned.

Jeeny:
(smiling softly)
But each one leaves a trace, doesn’t it? Even if we forget the science, or the details — the feeling remains.

Jack:
The awe of it.

Jeeny:
Yes. That brief moment of believing you could understand something infinite.

Jack:
And then you return to being small — but a little less ignorant.

Jeeny:
Or at least, a little more curious.

Host:
The lights above flickered again, and one by one, the stars on the ceiling went dark. The illusion collapsed, but the silence that followed carried a strange beauty — the kind that lingers after applause.

Jeeny:
You ever think that maybe all knowledge is like acting?

Jack:
How do you mean?

Jeeny:
We study our lines, rehearse our beliefs, wear costumes of certainty — but deep down, we know it’s all temporary.

Jack:
And yet, for those moments, it feels real.

Jeeny:
Because it is real — just not eternal.

Jack:
(softly)
So, the truth is in the pretending.

Jeeny:
Exactly. The pretending is what makes us human.

Jack:
Maybe that’s what Murphy was saying — he’s not mocking his own superficiality. He’s acknowledging the humanity in it.

Jeeny:
And the humility of letting go when the obsession ends.

Host:
A door creaked somewhere behind them — a janitor, perhaps, coming to shut down the set for the night. The sound echoed through the cavernous space like the closing of a scene.

Host:
And as the lights dimmed, Cillian Murphy’s words floated through the quiet, not as self-deprecation, but as quiet wisdom:

That curiosity need not be permanent to be profound.
That we can love ideas briefly and still love them truly.

That every obsession is a rehearsal for understanding —
temporary, fragile, yet necessary.

And that sometimes, knowing how little we know
is the most honest kind of knowledge.

The stars faded from the ceiling.
The set went dark.

And as Jack and Jeeny stepped out into the warm, humming night,
they carried no knowledge of space —
only the quiet gravity of realization:

that the beauty of learning
is not in what stays,
but in what passes through us,
leaving light behind.