Top Gun is still one of the more popular movies ever made by two of its stars, Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer. The two played rivals on the set, but how did the actual actors get along while making the film? During a recent online Q & A session, one fan asked Kilmer if stories that the two did not get along were true. According to the former Iceman, the two actually got along really well. It sounds like the two would have had a lot fun away from the set too, except that Cruise always had a lot more work to do. According to Kilmer...
He was a sweetheart. We were all quite rowdy me and all the real flyboys and the actors, so I actually felt a little sorry for him cause we all had time to play and date the cute extras and zoom around San Diego in muscle cars, but Tom was always in some scene and never go to play with us...
Top Gun was, in many ways, the film that transformed Tom Cruise from "leading man" to "movie star." That shift in perception did not come without hard work apparently. Val Kilmer took part in an AMA on Reddit whee he revealed that while much of the cast and crew, and extras apparently, were having a lot of fun making the movie, Cruise was always working.
Looking back on the film, it clearly makes sense. Tom Cruise is in nearly every scene in Top Gun. If the movie was filming, then he was likely working. However, Val Kilmer's Iceman isn't in the movie nearly as much, which meant he would have had some downtime during large portions of the production schedule.
While Tom Cruise's personal life is often a target for late-night talks shows and the like, it seems to be difficult to find anybody who's made a movie with Cruise who doesn't like the guy. Pretty much everybody that he's ever worked with has nothing but good things to say about the actor.
One would assume that, if they all had fun making the first Top Gun pretty much everybody involved, including extras, would be willing to return for a sequel. Top Gun 2 is one of those projects that seemingly will never die. It's been in development hell for years but even in January of 2016 producer Jerry Bruckheimer was apparently meeting with Cruise to discuss the project. Both Tom Crusie and Val Kilmer have said they'd love to return if a sequel ever happened. Though Tom Cruise insists that any sequel would require the use of actual jets rather than CGI. We'll just have to keep waiting to see if anything ever happens to shift this idea out of the Danger Zone.
