More than two years after it was reported that Tom Cruise might shoot a movie aboard the International Space Station, it appears the actor is getting closer to becoming “the first civilian to perform a spacewalk.”
In May 2020, NASA confirmed that it was in talks with Cruise and SpaceX for a film project unrelated to the Mission: Impossible movies. “We need popular media to inspire a new generation of engineers and scientists to make @NASA’s ambitious plans a reality,” NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine wrote at the time.
Donna Langley, president of Universal Filmed Entertainment Group, told the BBC that sending Cruise into space is part of the studio’s mission, and gave more details about the project. She said Tom Cruise and director Doug Liman pitched the film during the pandemic. The film itself “actually takes place on Earth, and then the character has to go into space to save the day.
Tom Cruise takes us into space. He takes the world into space. That’s the plan,” Langley said. However, the film is still in the dream phase and production has not yet begun. Cruise already has some experience with the ISS as he narrated, via Earth, the 2002 IMAX documentary Space Station 3D.
