Veteran star Cary Elwes and Tom Cruise were co-stars on the film ‘Days of Thunder.’ Years later, the famed actor recalls what it was like to work with the ‘Mission: Impossible’ actor and how he was on the first day of the shoot.
Cary Elwes talks about Tom Cruise’s first day driving on the sets of ‘Days of Thunder’
While talking to Entertainment Tonight, Elwes chuckled when he looked back at his and Cruise’s work on ‘Days of Thunder.’ He recalled a major incident on the first day of the shoot, which involved the ‘Vanilla Sky’ actor driving his car for the first time.However, Cruise caused a major accident on the first day of filming itself. Elwes recalled that the actor crashed the car he was supposed to drive in the film into a wall. “Tom put a car into the wall, actually, on his first day of driving. And these things aren’t cheap. And he was so funny. On film, his last words before crashing were, ‘Hello, wall,’” the actor shared.The 63-year-old then weighed in on what a great guy Cruise is. He added, “He’s a terrific guy. He really is so fun to work with, so, so professional and so supportive of everybody.”
Cary Elwes on having a hard time driving cars on set
While Cruise came prepared and was used to racing cars before the film, Cary was a complete newbie and unaware of how to handle the race car. He commented that “I had to learn how to drive NASCAR, and it was a challenge, because we had three cameras on the car.” He further revealed that driving with stuntmen was a task in itself and he had many things to do on camera after reaching 120 kmph speed, which was one of the hardest things that he had done.
Plot of ‘Days of Thunder’
The 1990 film revolves around a young, reckless, yet talented race car driver named Cole Trickle. When picked for the NASCAR Winston Cup Series, he arrogantly goes against his chief and crew, but ends up in a near-fatal crash. After recovering, he falls for his doctor, and returns to the game to defeat another arrogant rookie that has joined the gang.
