Behind the Hilarity: How Tom Cruise Created the Iconic Les Grossman in Tropic Thunder
A look back at the creation of the funniest character in “Tropic Thunder”, imagined and played by Tom Cruise.
In 2008, Tropic Thunder was released, an irresistible parody of the war film in which Ben Stiller and his host of actors happily mocked classics of the seventh art such as Platoon or Apocalypse Now.
Dotted with sequences that are each more childish and hilarious than the last (starting with the fake trailers at the beginning), the feature film owes some of its best scenes to the character of Les Grossman: this despicable and rude Hollywood producer, capable of copiously insulting fearsome drug traffickers on the phone and shaking his hips to hip-hop in the final credits.
As you know if you’ve seen Tropic Thunder, beneath the producer’s balding head and generous plumpness lies in reality… Tom Cruise. But the Mission Impossible star didn’t just agree to play this protagonist, light years away from those he used to play.
“He read the script and he came up with the idea of this character.”
Indeed, as Ben Stiller had recounted in 2015 at the microphone of Grantlandit was Tom Cruise himself who had the idea of integrating this improbable character into the film’s script:
“I had spoken with Tom to have him in the film”explained Stiller, who had initially thought of offering Tom Cruise the lead role before playing it himself. “He read the script and he came up with the idea of this character.”
DreamWorks SKG
And screenwriter Stuart Cornfeld added:
“Tom read the script before Les Grossman and said, ‘I think you need another villain, besides this 12-year-old drug lord. How about a greedy studio producer who would represent the gritty side of Hollywood?'”
“I think you need another villain.”
“Ben [Stiller] decided he was going to play Speedman [le personnage principal]and he got a call from Tom, who said he couldn’t get the script out of his head. Tom asked what was left, Ben told him the part of Les Grossman hadn’t been cast yet, and Tom said, ‘I’ll play that.'”
So we owe not only to Tom Cruise the memorable interpretation of Les Grossman, but also the pure and simple invention of this character that made all the fans of Tropic Thunder die of laughter. According to Ben Stiller, he even insisted on dancing in the film.
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