Simon Pegg was filming Mission Impossible on a mountain in South Africa with Tom Cruise when the Top Gun hero decided he wanted to swim with sharks… so the pair hopped in a helicopter and lashed out to sea
Simon Pegg today revealed how he teases his Mission Impossible co-star Tom Cruise about his “ridiculous” superstar lifestyle.
The comedian, 53, who landed an unlikely franchise with Cruise when he was cast in the 2006 film Mission: Impossible III, said even the Hollywood star realized some of his antics bordered on the bizarre.
Pegg told Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs: ‘I always make fun of him for it – the things he has access to. Like we were filming in South Africa recently.
“We were filming on this mountain in the morning and that’s when he decided he wanted to go swimming with sharks. So he flew us in a helicopter to this coastal part of South Africa and we had a tailor-made trip and dived with sharks and things like that.”
He added: ‘At the end of the day we drove back and that was a real Tom Cruise day, wasn’t it? It was just a bit of a Tom Cruise day. He sometimes appreciates the ridiculousness of it.’
Simon Pegg has revealed that he mocks Tom Cruise about his ‘ridiculous’ superstar lifestyle
The British comedian said he made it a point not to ask Cruise, a Scientologist, about his private life or personal beliefs.
He said, “No, I don’t ask him about that kind of thing, because I feel like doing so would abuse my privileged access I get to him. My relationship with him is very simple and lovable. We are friends.’
Pegg said he personally couldn’t handle the kind of global admiration for Cruise.
He said, “He loves it… It energizes him and it spurs him on. I don’t think I would particularly appreciate that. I would find that very stressful and overwhelming and I would kind of want to withdraw from it.”
Pegg also spoke candidly about his successful battle with the depression and alcohol abuse that took root on the set of his first Mission Impossible movie.
The comedian and Hollywood star first became friends when they cast together in the 2006 blockbuster Mission: Impossible III
He said, “The thing is, you get really sneaky when you have something like that in your life. You learn how to do it without anyone noticing because it takes over and it wants to sustain itself and it will do anything it can to not be stopped. But eventually it got to a point where it couldn’t be hidden anymore and then I was able to pull out of the dive thankfully.’
The actor also paid tribute to the teacher who helped him turn his life around by refusing him the lead role in Hamlet.
He said: ‘I had become a bit of a Goth and I had discovered several things that you discover at 16 and my teacher at the time, Gordon Vallins, who was the head of the course, said you’re not going to play Hamlet. are going to play the ghost of Hamlet.’
He added: ‘Gordon was and is a lovely man. He was so caring and he did the right thing. He noticed I was drifting into possibly not going to college, so he put me back on track and it worked.”
Desert Island Discs is on BBC Radio 4 at 11.15am today and repeats at 9am on Friday.