Tom Cruise Is 'Too Old' for Jack Reacher, Says Author Lee Child
Tom Cruise has been a movie star for virtually his entire adult life; he moved to New York City at 18 to pursue an acting career and soon enough had a career-making turn in Risky Business, and his first action movie, 1986’s Top Gun. He’s returning to that franchise for the sequel, Top Gun: Maverick, next year—more than 30 years after the original.
Just last year he helmed Mission: Impossible – Fallout, the sixth entry in a series that started in 1996; despite a broken ankle and odd rumors about the realness of Cruise’s butt (it is), Fallout was the most critically and commercially successful Mission: Impossible film so far.
All of which is to say that Tom Cruise knows how to be an action star. But he’s also 57 years old. And according to best-selling author Lee Child, it’s time for Cruise to hang up his spurs. Speaking to the Times of London about his decision to end the Cruise-helmed Jack Reacher film franchise after two installments, Child said, “It sounds extremely patronizing, but I think it’s good for him. He’s too old for this stuff.”
He went on to say, “He’s 57, he needs to move on, transition to being a character actor. He could get another 20 years out of it. He is talented. He’s a terrific guy, very considerate, good fun.” (It’s not clear whether Child has noticed Liam Neeson, Bruce Willis, Sylvester Stallone, and the rise of the “geri-action” movie.)
Child also pointed out that Cruise stands 5’8” on a good day, while the fictional Jack Reacher is a brawny 6’5” in the books. The height difference was apparently part of Child’s decision to pull the plug on future Reacher movies and instead go make a TV series starring a different, presumably taller actor. We’ll see whether Cruise takes his advice to stop hanging out of helicopters and settle into doing more character work.
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