What if Tom Cruise starred in F1 instead of Brad Pitt? “We’d have had a crash”

Joseph Kosinski’s upcoming F1 movie starring Brad Pitt has been described as Top Gun: Maverick on wheels — so it raises an intriguing possibility: what if Tom Cruise were starring instead?

GQ posed that very question to Kosinski during a recent interview. “Tom always pushes it to the limit, but at the same time is super capable and very skilled,” Kosinski said. “They both have the natural talent for driving. But yeah, I could see Tom maybe scaring us a little bit more.“

Graham Kelly, the action-vehicle supervisor on F1, went a little further. “We’d have had a crash,” he said. “Tom pushes it to the limit. I mean really to the limit. That terrifies me. I mean, I’ve done loads of Mission: Impossibles with Tom and it’s the most stressful experience for someone like me building cars for him, doing stunts with him. Whereas Brad listens and he knows his abilities, and I think he’d be the first to say, ‘Yeah, I’m not going to do that.’“

At one point, Kosinski was developing his own take on Ford v Ferrari, with Cruise and Pitt set to star. Both actors were eager to handle their own driving scenes, but the project stalled when Kosinski’s proposed budget proved too steep for the studio. Ultimately, James Mangold took the helm, directing the version that starred Christian Bale and Matt Damon.

Cruise has been considering a sequel to Days of Thunder, so perhaps he’ll get the chance to push racing to the limit and freak out Graham Kelly at the same time.

The official synopsis for F1: “Dubbed ‘the greatest that never was,’ Sonny Hayes (Brad Pitt) was FORMULA 1’s most promising phenom of the 1990s until an accident on the track nearly ended his career.  Thirty years later, he’s a nomadic racer-for-hire when he’s approached by his former teammate Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem), owner of a struggling FORMULA 1 team that is on the verge of collapse.  Ruben convinces Sonny to come back to FORMULA 1 for one last shot at saving the team and being the best in the world.  He’ll drive alongside Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris), the team’s hotshot rookie intent on setting his own pace.  But as the engines roar, Sonny’s past catches up with him and he finds that in FORMULA 1, your teammate is your fiercest competition—and the road to redemption is not something you can travel alone.” The film will hit theaters on June 27.

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