How Tom Cruise transformed into Digger

To become Alejandro González Iñárritu’s wealthy oil tycoon, the actor initially had to spend six hours in makeup. He managed to reduce the transformation to less than an hour…

Tom Cruise can do anything.

Even transforming himself into a paunchy, eccentric businessman.

In Diggerthe 64-year-old actor plays Digger Rockwell, a wealthy oil tycoon with impressive looks. An appearance that required a certain investment: Tom Cruise had to play with a fat suit (magnifying suit) and several prostheses. A process that initially took six hours to set up each day before filming began. Podcast guest New Heights by Travis and Jason Kelce, Tom Cruise told the story behind the scenes of his transformation and especially how he managed to make the process more efficient.

“The first time we did the makeup, it took six hours, OK?“, says Cruise. An installation that is impossible to fit into his schedule:

“I have to sleep at least six hours a night. They keep saying I need more…but hey, OK for six hours. So it’s been twelve hours already. Then we have twelve-hour filming days. So it didn’t fit…“

To speed up the process, Cruise arrived with a chart and began timing the time it took to fit each prosthesis.

“I had a guy with a stopwatch and I was like, OK, do you see this time? Six hours? This is not possible. So, when we’re done, we’ll be under the hour mark! They told me: ‘No, not possible, it will never happen’. I said, ‘First of all, if you say no, if you say you can’t do it, you’ll never do it. So, can we at least agree to try to reduce this time a little?“

Each item that was placed on Tom Cruise’s face was therefore timed, and then the team repeated over and over again to gain a few seconds.

“With each piece we added, we timed it, then practiced and repeated.” And it worked. The team ultimately managed to reduce Cruise’s transformation to less than an hour:

“They were like, “Whaaat?!” And they didn’t even realize it, they didn’t even speed up… I like to get into a system, study it, and try to figure out how I can do it better, more efficiently. For the films I make, I constantly ask myself: how can we do better?“

But even after drastically reducing your time spent on makeup, wearing the fat suit and the prostheses remained particularly exhausting to wear:

“I’m sweating throughout the whole movie, because I’m wearing these prosthetics. And the scenes are long sequence shots, and with the pace of it all – you really have to know what you’re doing. But I’m sweating underneath, so I’ve found all kinds of solutions, like machines to cool me down…”

It remains to be seen whether Tom Cruise’s devotion to the role will allow him to win the Oscar for Best Actor that he is missing…

Digger is currently in theaters.