Glen Powell recalls how Tom Cruise almost killed him while they were in London doing reshoots for Joseph Kosinski's Top Gun: Maverick. More than three decades after the first Top Gun film, Paramount revisited the cult classic with a follow-up. While the blockbuster primarily focused on Cruise's Maverick and his personal arc, it also introduced a few new elite pilots including Rooster Bradshaw — the son of Goose Bradshaw, played by Miles Teller, as well as Powell's Hangman. While making the movie, Cruise and the cast also found ways to wind down during their breaks.
For Powell, that's trying skydiving in London while they were doing additional photography for Top Gun: Maverick. Sharing the story on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon while promoting his new film, Devotion, with Kang the Conqueror actor Jonathan Majors, the actor reveals that Cruise arranged for his skydiving outing and asked that he jump alone. Powell did, but he encountered some issues on his way down to the point that he thought he was going to die. Read his full story below:
That was actually the second date with my girlfriend... We were gonna go do some reshoots in London. I say 'I wanna go skydiving while I'm at here' and he says "The skydiving here is great." Sends a helicopter for me but it got so windy that the skydiving team, I was with the UK skydiving team, they said it's so dangerous we should not go skydiving. I said 'Alright, I'm no hero.' So we scrapped it and went back and then Tom hit me up a couple of weeks later he said 'Hey man, what are you scared?' You never took me up on skydiving. So, with the girl that I was seeing at that time, it was our second date, we went skydiving and when I got there, I found out that Tom's only request was that Glen cannot go skydiving with another person. He has to go solo the first time. So I literally have to jump out of this plane by myself, but the worst part is that I couldn't find my tab when I was falling. My first thought was like 'Oh Tom just killed me, he's gonna feel so bad.' I'm looking for the tab and I went 'You're not Tom Cruise, you'll never be Tom Cruise why did you do this?' And then I finally pulled out, I was way below, came in hot, made it.
Cruise's Commitment To Wild Stunts Is What Makes Him A Special Movie Star
It's no secret the lengths that Cruise had to go through to ensure that Top Gun: Maverick captures the thrill of Naval flying. The film used very little CGI and all the primary actors, including the neophyte pilots, go through actual training, so they know how to fly their respective aircraft. Somehow, it seemed like Cruise's daredevil ways rubbed off on Powell, and it made sense that he reached out to his A-list co-star for his own skydiving adventure. Unfortunately, he didn't foresee that Cruise would be making it extra challenging for him as he was forced to do it on his own.
Even before Top Gun: Maverick, Cruise had already made a name for himself when it comes to doing his own stunts. He continues to push the boundaries in the Mission: Impossible franchise, which he also spearheads. Throughout the action-adventure franchise's history, the actor has climbed the Burj Kalifa in Dubai, clung to the side of an Airbus 400 at full speed in Rogue Nation, hung from a helicopter, and skydived. The last one may have been something that Powell was thinking about when he was also skydiving in London.
It's uncertain if Cruise and Powell will share the screen again in the Top Gun franchise. While there's a clear interest in Top Gun 3, Paramount still hasn't officially ordered the project. But if the threequel finally moves forward, it will be interesting to see the pair interact more, especially when Top Gun: Maverick showed that Hangman is Maverick's real successor.