The long-running and highly successful Mission: Impossible series will continue with a sixth installment, starring Tom Cruise and directed by Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation's Christopher McQuarrie. Reportedly, Cruise trained for a year to pull off the movie's signature stunt, which is supposed to top the actor's Burj Khalifa building-dangle in Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol and the ride he took outside an airplane in Rogue Nation.
In addition to daredevil Cruise, Mission: Impossible 6 will also bring back Simon Pegg (a fixture since the J.J. Abrams-helmed Mission: Impossible III), Jeremy Renner and Rebecca Ferguson. Superman actor Henry Cavill is the biggest new cast-member to be announced so far. The Crown actress Vanessa Kirby has also been brought aboard to play the female lead opposite Cruise.
Slowly the supporting cast for Mission: Impossible 6 is filling out. Variety reports the newest addition to the ensemble is Sherlock actress Sian Brooke. None of the cast members' specific roles have been revealed yet and that is again the case with Brooke. According to Variety, Brooke's work on Sherlock specifically caught the eye of studio executives, leading to her casting in the newest series installment. Production on Mission: Impossible 6 is expected to kick off sometime in the spring.
On Sherlock, Brooke plays Eurus Holmes, the long-lost sister of Benedict Cumberbatch's title detective. Eurus' talents for disguise show that Sherlock isn't the only unusually gifted member of the Holmes family (coincidentally, disguises also figure heavily into Mission: Impossible). Brooke also played Lori Marcuse in Channel 4's Cape Wrath, Martine McCutcheon in Channel 4's Not Safe For Work and Natalie Brown in BBC 1's The Moorside miniseries. As Brooke and Mission: Impossible 6 co-star Vanessa Kirby demonstrate, if you want to star alongside Tom Cruise, British TV is a great launching pad.
Casting is always a big deal with any Mission: Impossible movie, as Tom Cruise loves surrounding himself with strong actors who bring a lot to the table (and help make him look good). Possibly the best example of outside-the-box casting in the series came in Mission: Impossible III when Philip Seymour Hoffman was chosen to play the villain. Anthony Hopkins, Jean Reno, Vanessa Redgrave and Alec Baldwin have all popped in for guest appearances over the years.
The Mission: Impossible movies have always boasted strong female supporting performers as well, with Ferguson just being the most recent example. Emmanuelle Beart, Thandie Newton, Michelle Monaghan, Maggie Q, Keri Russell, Paula Patton and Lea Seydoux have all put in their time alongside Cruise's action-man Ethan Hunt over the years. We'll see what Mission: Impossible 6 has in store for newest cast member Brooke.
Next: Mission: Impossible 6 Casts Henry Cavill
Source: Variety
