Exclusive: Tom Cruise And Will Smith In Talks To Pair Together In Spy Games
Tom Cruise and Will Smith may both star in a new Sam Mendes spy thriller.
Tom Cruise and Will Smith are in negotiations with DreamWorks to star together in a film for the very first time. According to our trusted and proven sources, the two blockbuster titans of cinema may soon be starring in an espionage thriller titled Spy Games (though it probably has no connection to the 2001 Brad Pitt-Robert Redford movie Spy Game), tentatively to be directed by Sam Mendes. If DreamWorks manages to lock down both Tom Cruise and Will Smith for this movie, it could potentially be a historically huge film.
If all goes well at the bargaining table, Spy Games will star Tom Cruise and Will Smith as two espionage agents sent on a dangerous mission to gather information on a foreign power. It is not clear whether or not this movie may go full buddy-cop, but the opportunity certainly seems there.
For decades now, Tom Cruise and Will Smith have dominated the global box office as big-budget film leads. In many ways, the two actors were each other’s only significant rivals as the top box office draws through the 1990s and early 2000s, which explains why they have never starred in a film together. However, by all reports, the Mission Impossible and I Am Legend stars have been friendly for years and have considered previous projects, so it is interesting to see them going for it now.
It is worth noting that Tom Cruise and Will Smith have been on very different career trajectories of late. Cruise has focused his attention on his mega-successful Mission Impossible franchise to the exclusion of almost all else (except maybe deadly space stunts). That may be changing with the staggering global box office of Top Gun: Maverick, but considering he has two more Mission Impossible sequels in the works, maybe not.
On the other hand, Will Smith reacted to the back-to-back disappointments of Men in Black 3, his notorious sci-fi flop After Earth, the bizarre Winter’s Tale, the mess that was David Ayers’ Suicide Squad, and the critically reviled Netflix movie Bright with some odd choice. He popped up as the Genie in the instantly forgotten live-action remake of Aladdin, as well as the equally little-remembered Ang Lee movie Gemini Man and a Bad Boys sequel.
Then came his Academy Award win for King Richard and the infamous Chris Rock slap incident, which ground his career to a halt. Reportedly, even Tom Cruise was avoiding Will Smith’s calls in the aftermath of the slap, so the latter actor’s slow and steady public relations campaign must be having some effect.
Regardless of the reasons for the duo to finally decide to work together now, Tom Cruise and Will Smith starring together in Spy Games would be a pretty huge deal for Universal Pictures, the studio behind DreamWorks. It makes sense to recruit Sam Mendes, the director behind Skyfall, one of the most critically acclaimed James Bond films (plus Spectre, but we won’t hold that against him). We’ll just have to see whether it all comes together.
