Nothing is impossible—just ask Tom Cruise!
When the 53-year-old movie star attended the New York City premiere of Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation Monday, he admitted to E! News that he'd like to play IMF agent Ethan Hunt for at least three more decades. At what age would Cruise consider saying goodbye to the film franchise, which began in the summer of 1996?
"I'm thinking about 90, then I'll cap it off. Something like that!" he said on the red carpet. Cruise imagined what it might be like, joking, "They will be throwing me out of planes in my wheelchair at that point, so whatever it takes, we'll keep going!"
For Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, Cruise filmed a scene in which Ethan flew on the outside of an Airbus A400M. He has always preferred to do his own stunts, and this was no exception. "I'd rather fly an airplane. I'm a pilot. I fly aerobatics," he said. "Whatever I can do to really put the audience in the scene with the character and in the movie, that's what I want, so whatever it takes. Whatever it takes!"
Why risk injury, or heaven forbid, death? "I prefer to do everything live in camera. I think that...Look, CGI, we're lucky to have it because it's a tool, just like practical stunts are a tool," Cruise explained to E! News. "And it takes everyone. It takes a village making these movies. They're incredible, top to bottom, these guys."
Regarding his plane stunt, Cruise confessed to Jimmy Fallon Monday night, "I didn't tell my family or friends or anyone I was doing it beforehand. But, look, I do it because it's entertaining to you all. I want to entertain you!"
In another scene, Cruise's character has to dive into an underwater safe to retrieve the computer chip that will lead him closer to The Syndicate. The stunt required Cruise to jump off a 120-foot ledge. Then, in an underwater set that was filled 20-feet high with water, he had to hold his breath for six minutes. "The takes are really long," Cruise said on The Tonight Show, explaining that he "had to train beyond it" because "when you go to shoot, I have to take the regulator out, get on the side of this set underwater, then the camera comes in place and then we call action. It was just very long takes. You'll see in the movie they're just really, really long takes. We wanted to it practical." Practical as it was, he said, "It was deathful."
That's an understatement!
As Fallon noted, "He works hard for the money!"
Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation is in theaters Friday.
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