Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning star Pom Klementieff revealed Tom Cruise refused to kick her per her request during a fight scene

Tom Cruise is known for the extra miles he’d go to make things as real as possible for the Mission: Impossible movies. He will risk life and limb to ensure the scene lands with the audience and prides himself on entertaining the viewers. Christopher McQuarrie, the writer/director of the last couple of entries in the series, professed that he and Tom come up with the intricately-planned, death-defying sequences by just asking each other what they want to do, then barely hesitate to do it. While Tom Cruise is willing to put himself on the line, he also feels responsible for the safety of others as he also has been revealed to have refused his co-star, Pom Klementieff’s request to kick her in the stomach for real in a fight scene.

According to IndieWire, the actress known primarily for appearing alongside the Guardians of the Galaxy begged Cruise to kick her in her midsection while filming a fight between them. Ever the gentleman Cruise simply could not grant her request. Klementieff recently told Entertainment Weekly, “I kept telling him to just kick me here. I was squeezing abs. [I said], ‘You can just go for it.’ He was like ‘No, no, no, no, no.’ I was like, ‘But it’s going to help me!’ But he wouldn’t do it.“ Klementieff found the production immensely exciting in general as she was in the crux of the action. “It was so special to be on location in Rome. We were shooting during COVID, so we were very lucky to be here. I was trying to not laugh too much because I was having so much fun in the car following the Fiat.”

Klementieff’s character is the mysterious assassin by the name of Paris. She boasts that this will be a different character than has ever been in any of the movies. “When Christopher McQuarrie cast me for the role, he didn’t know which name the character would have. It was cool to name me Paris, me being from France, and then they decided that I would speak French because I speak French in real life. [Paris] is very different style-wise from every other actress in the Mission: Impossible franchise. She has a side that’s a bit more punk and she doesn’t really give a f*ck. So that was cool.” 

You can see Tom abiding by stage combat safety measures in Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One on July 12.