Mission: Impossible 7: Why Tom Cruise Jumping Off A Cliff Made The Cast Laugh
It turns out that some of Tom Cruise's fellow cast members on "Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part 1" reacted in an unexpected way to the adrenaline-fueled actor's first run at jumping off a cliff on a motorcycle for the movie.
In a video posted July 10, 2023, on Simon Pegg's official Twitter account, Pegg captures his "M:I 7" co-stars Hayley Atwell and Pom Klementieff, among others on set, in fits of laughter as Cruise soared off the platform on his motorcycle. Captured on day one of shooting, Cruise filmed "M:I 7's" most dangerous stunt first for a terrifyingly bleak reason. If the stunt failed and he was severely injured or killed, it would effectively cancel the remainder of the rest of the production, Cruise told Entertainment Tonight with a laugh.
Discussing the jump with Atwell, The Hollywood Reporter asked the actor if laughter was "a way to cope with the sheer terror" of what Cruise was doing. "I think it was just the exasperation," Atwell told THR. "We'd heard about this, and we'd seen him in preparation and training for it. We'd seen the engineers design and build that ramp at that location. We'd seen him that morning jump off the helicopter over that precipice to test the wind, and so the laughter came out of just awe. A man was risking his life for the movie and to delight his audiences."
Cruise's motorcycle jump off a cliff was the first of many
From the vantage point of Hayley Atwell, Pom Klementieff, and Simon Pegg, the trio could only see Tom Cruise's motorcycle jump from a ramp off the cliff for the death-defying "M:I 7" scene. What they didn't know was if Cruise's parachute deployed properly during his base jump off the motorcycle. It was only when they received the good news that Atwell was able to let loose with a sense of relief.
"I actually laughed more once I'd heard that the canopy had successfully been deployed and he'd made it back to the ground," Atwell told THR. But being that this was the actor's first time working with Cruise, Atwell — whose "M:I 7" role had been in the works for 10 years — learned that performing a stunt is never a one-and-done scenario for the legendary action star.
According to a behind-the-scenes featurette from the "M:I 7" production, Cruise made the cliff jump six times in all. "I laughed even harder when the first words out of his mouth were something like, 'Okay, I think I can go further off the motorbike.' He was immediately giving himself notes about how to do it better next time," Atwell recalled for THR. "He was like, 'Okay, yep. We got that one. Let's move on.' So the sheer dedication to craft and to entertain just takes your breath away.
Directed by Christopher McQuarrie and also starring Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Vanessa Kirby, and Esai Morales, "Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part 1" is playing in theaters.