Brian Robbins, the CEO of Paramount, recalls a major disagreement between the studio and Tom Cruise over aspects of Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One and Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two. The seventh installment in the long-running action franchise sees Cruise return as superspy Ethan Hunt to face off against a dangerous AI threat. The film, which is again directed by Christopher McQuarrie, was hit hard by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused its budget to grow from what had originally been planned to an estimated $290 million.
Now, in a recent interview with Variety, Robbins addresses the impasse that occurred between Paramount and Cruise regarding Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One. In addition to that film’s growing ever-increasing budget, a particular sticking point was Cruise and McQuarrie’s insistence late in the game on adding in a submarine sequence that had previously been planned to feature in Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two. Check out Robbins’ comment on the feud below:
“Let’s just say that the studio and the production and Tom were in a disagreement over direction, and there was a stalemate going on. We had to hit the pause button. They were stuck on how they were going to move forward with ‘Dead Reckoning Part Two’ while finishing ‘Part One.’ It was a production issue, and it was about the scope of what was being asked for. And the question we needed to ask was do we need this and why? And then how big is it going to be, and how long is that going to take?”
Mission: Impossible 7’s Troubled Production Explained
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One was in production in Italy when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, forcing everything to shut down. In all, the film was shutdown a total of seven times since February of 2020, which put an enormous strain on the film’s budget. The cast and crew remained employed through each and every shutdown, with Cruise himself even footing an estimated $700,000 bill to charter two cruise ships to house everyone involved in the production.
The Mission: Impossible 7 production was evidently a stressful time for everyone involved, with audio infamously leaking of Cruise having an angry outburst on set at crew members who weren’t following COVID safety protocols. The trouble that the pandemic caused for the production was compounded by the fact that Cruise and McQuarrie tend to approach each Mission: Impossible movie with a looser idea of what the film will look like rather than a cut and dry blueprint.
This approach of being open to follow various creative avenues while shaping aspects of the film as they’re going led to Cruise and McQuarrie deciding that a submarine sequence was key to establishing Mission: Impossible 7’s AI villain. Before Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One was even released, work on the next film in the franchise had already begun. Filming on Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two seemingly also can’t catch a break, however, with the planned resuming of production in the fall likely to be affected by the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike.