After three months since production had been temporarily shut down on Christopher McQuarrie’s Mission: Impossible 7 in Venice, Italy, first assistant director Tommy Gormley has confirmed that filming might finally restart in September. Speaking on BBC Radio 4 (via Variety), Gormley has revealed that despite the major production delay, the team is still confident that they can meet the target timeframe of the production which would be from September to April/ May 2021.
“We hope to restart in September.” Gormley said. “We hope to visit all the countries we planned to. We hope to do a big chunk of it back in the U.K. on the backlot and in the studio.”
When asked about the difficulties of filming a high-scale project during this time of pandemic, he answered, “This is our challenge. We are not a chamber piece movie. We do spectacle, and that is what people expect of us. If we have the protocols in place and we break down all the procedures very carefully…we will get it going again. Some things are very challenging such as stunt scenes, crowd scenes etc. but we can’t do a ‘Mission Impossible’ movie and not have a fight scene or car scenes in it.”
In addition, long time Mission: Impossible cast member Simon Pegg has also echoed Gormley’s statement, revealing that production might indeed resume in September and that they would begin shooting the outdoor scenes first. Their confirmation comes a day after the British Film Commission has released the COVID-19 safety guidelines which will allow film and high-end TV productions to resume in the UK.
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Joining Tom Cruise and Hayley Atwell are returning Mission: Impossible alums Rebecca Ferguson (Doctor Sleep), Simon Pegg (Ready Player One), Ving Rhames (Pulp Fiction), Vanessa Kirby (Hobbs & Shaw) and Henry Czerny (Ready or Not) along with newcomers Shea Whigham (Joker), Pom Klementieff (Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Avengers: Infinity War) and Esai Morales (La Bamba, Titans) who will replace Nicholas Hoult (Mad Max: Fury Road) for the villain role.
Following the large critical and commercial success of the past two installments, writer/director Christopher McQuarrie signed a new deal with Paramount to return to write and direct the next two installments, turning down other studio offers to continue his long-running partnership with franchise star Tom Cruise. Skydance Media, who joined the franchise with the fourth installment, Ghost Protocol, will be returning to produce the next two entries.
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The Mission: Impossible franchise spans almost 25 years and six films, starting off with modest critical and major box office success in the first two films before launching its lead protagonist into grittier and more explosive stories, each film getting progressively better reviews than its predecessor, with the most recent installment, Fallout, earning the highest reviews for both the franchise and the action genre, currently maintaining a 97% approval rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes while also acquiring the highest box office gross of the franchise at over $790 million worldwide.
Mission: Impossible 7 is set to premiere on November 19, 2021 followed by Mission: Impossible 8 on November 4, 2022.
