Paramount Keeping ‘M:I 6 – Mission Impossible’ Date Despite Broken Ankle For Tom Cruise

UPDATED with Paramount statement: Paramount just issued an official statement regarding Tom Cruise and Mission: Impossible 6. The studio expects to keep its summer 2018 date despite the star’s broken ankle.

Per Paramount: “During production on the latest Mission: Impossible film, Tom Cruise broke his ankle while performing a stunt. Production will go on hiatus while Tom makes a full recovery, and the film remains on schedule to open July 27, 2018. Tom wants to thank you all for your concern and support and can’t wait to share the film with everyone next summer.”

PREVIOUSLY, 10:11 AM: The well-publicized stunt mishap that saw Tom Cruise leap from one building and slam into another has prompted Paramount and Skydance to shut down production for a minimum of nine weeks and up to three months on M:I 6 – Mission Impossible, because that is how long it will take for Cruise’s injuries to heal. This almost certainly will unseat the film from its July 27, 2018, release date.

While it looked like Cruise’s torso took the brunt of the damage, word has been circulating that he suffered a broken foot or ankle. The star was supposed to be seeing a doctor today for a final verdict, but rumors are rampant that the picture is halting.

Cruise is famous for doing what look like incredibly dangerous stunts. On previous Mission: Impossible films, that included Cruise swinging around on the outside of a Dubai skyscraper, 1700 feet off the ground for Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, and  more recently hanging on the outside of an Airbus 400 on takeoff for Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation.

Cruise emerged unscathed on both occasions. But given the recent death of trained stunt performers on The Walking Dead — where John Bernecker fell 30 feet to his death rehearsing a fight scene — and on Deadpool 2 — where Joi “SJ” Harris days ago careened out of control and died in a motorcycle crash — there are great dangers in this pursuit. It seems likely that Cruise’s co-producers and film backers will push back a little harder next time the prideful star, who is incredibly fit but turned 55 years old in July, eschews a stuntman and insists on putting himself as risk like this.

Cruise is no reckless cowboy here: the star is meticulous in planning with stunt coordinators those signature shots where he puts himself at risk. He has told me that he truly feels that certain stunts in movies that don’t have the star in the shot look fake enough to take the audience out of the movie. When I asked him how he can strap on a harness and swing around the outside of a skyscraper 120 floors up, Cruise reasoned that he wasn’t bothered by the height; and if he was doing the same shot 20 floors up and fell, he would die from a mishap. So what difference should another 100 floors make? He is the only superstar who thinks that way, of course.