Elon Musk’s praise for Nikola Tesla mocked by Nosferatu star Nicholas Hoult with just eight words

Tesla boss Elon Musk has heaped praise on the company’s namesake – Nikola Tesla – and branded him “one of the greatest engineers ever” but the post on X / Twitter has resulted in Nosferatu and Renfield actor Nicholas Hoult ridiculing the tech billionaire.

That’s because alongside writing about the “penniless immigrant whose inventions led to American dominance in electricity generation and usage”, Musk attached a picture of Hoult from the 2017 film “The Current War”, in which he played the scientist.

Per IMDb, the movie – which also starred Benedict Cumberbatch, Michael Shannon and Tom Holland – tells “the dramatic story of the cutthroat race between electricity titans Thomas A. Edison and George Westinghouse to determine whose electrical system would power the modern world”.

And while it only has a Tomatometer score of 33 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes, Hoult has taken Musk’s use of his portrayal to talk about Tesla (as opposed to, you know, an actual picture of the Serbian-American inventor) as a positive.

The actor – soon to star as villain Lex Luthor in the upcoming Superman reboot – quoted Musk’s tweet and added: “Clearly a very convincing performance I gave here.”

Hoult’s intervention has since delighted fans, with one joining in the fun to brand him “the modern face of Tesla”.

Another joked about when the penny would drop for Musk.

And a third really didn’t expect this to happen in 2024 – with a few days to spare, no less.

Musk’s original post came amid an ongoing row within Trump’s supporter base over H1B immigration visas for “specialty occupations”, which MAGA activists want to see scrapped, but Musk supports.

In another own goal for Musk, he appealed for “more positive” posts on X / Twitter, just hours after he replied to another user on the platform with the words “f*** yourself in the face”.

It’s not been a good week for Elon...

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