Idris Elba Got Basketball Tips from Angel Reese While Filming Movie (Exclusive)

Idris Elba and Angel Reese weren’t wasting time on the set of A House of Dynamite. 

During the New York Film Festival premiere of their upcoming film on Sept. 28, the basketball star exclusively told PEOPLE that she not only looked to the Luther actor for advice during what marked her feature film debut, but also shared some of her own expertise. 

“He just said, ‘Stay confident. Be yourself. Have fun,’ ” Reese, 23, recalled costar Elba, 53, telling her on set. “We were shooting baskets … and I was teaching him a few things too, so it was really fun.”

While Reese is just entering the world of film with her involvement in the Kathryn Bigelow-directed political thriller, Elba is no stranger to portraying an important political figure on the big screen. 

Though he’s already played the U.K. prime minister in Heads of State alongside costar John Cena, Elba — dad to daughter Isan, 23, with ex-wife Hanne “Kim” Nørgaard, and son, Winston, 11, with ex-girlfriend Naiyana Garth — told PEOPLE he was “super conscious” about playing an American president as a British actor. 

“Playing the president was a challenge, but I’m hoping that … I wanted to bring a human side to this character, and I hope the audience enjoy that,” Elba explained.

Beyond stepping into a new and challenging role, the actor also emphasized how honored he was to be working with the Oscar-winning director on her first film since 2017’s Detroit. 

“Bucket list. Working with Kathryn was something that I always wanted to do,” Elba said. “I’m a big admirer of her films. But the truth is, we got to make a really important film. A film that’s going to highlight, I guess, the fragility of our world and who we are as people.”

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The thriller, which was written by former president of NBC News Noah Oppeneim, also stars Rebecca Ferguson, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Moses Ingram, Jonah Hauer-King, Greta Lee and Jason Clarke, among others.

“I grew up in an era when hiding under your school desk was considered the go-to protocol for surviving an atomic bomb,” Bigelow, 73, said in a statement for the Venice International Film Festival. “It seems absurd now — and it was — but at the time, the threat felt so immediate that such measures were taken seriously.”

A House of Dynamite is in theaters on Oct. 10. It will then stream on Netflix on Oct. 24.