For decades, Tom Cruise has been one of Hollywood’s biggest action stars. From performing increasingly outrageous stunts in the Mission: Impossible films to returning to the cockpit for Top Gun: Maverick, maintaining his fitness has become almost as synonymous with Cruise as the films themselves.

His latest project, however, looks very different.

At 64, Cruise has undergone a dramatic physical transformation for Alejandro G Iñárritu’s upcoming film Digger, swapping the familiar action-star aesthetic for a character almost unrecognisable as the Tom Cruise we’re used to seeing.

Tom Cruise’s Transformation for Digger

Speaking to Empire, Cruise described taking on the role as ‘a real leap into the unknown’.

‘I needed all of my knowledge, from all the years of every film I’ve made, to be able to play this character and fulfil the ambition of this movie,’ he said.

Cruise describes the character as ‘an American nightmare at the top of the American dream’ – and says he knew immediately that it was the kind of role he wanted to play.

‘This is the kind of character I want,’ he told director Iñárritu after being shown the project.

The transformation involved considerably more than changing his appearance. Cruise says the make-up, costume and even the way he moved all helped him build the character.

‘I can change the voice and, while they’re putting the make-up on, I start to feel the movement, I put the suit on, the boots, and I find my own rhythm,’ he explains.

Even His Teeth Helped Transform Him

Cruise also told Entertainment Weekly that Digger’s prosthetic teeth helped him disappear further into the character.

‘I put the teeth in and I thought, “Let’s fucking go!”’ he recalled.

For Cruise, every role has its own ‘musicality’ – something he searches for through the character’s voice, movement and appearance.

‘If you start to feel the musicality of the character, it has a rhythm, and it’s not a rhythm like any other,’ he explained.

‘So the behaviour of a character or the movement of the character are things that we’re looking at with the make-up too. As you develop it, you have to ask yourself: “Is this our tone? Is it drama? Is it comedy? Is it too much?” You keep adjusting it.’

After spending so much of his later career maintaining the fitness required to sprint, fight, fly aircraft and throw himself from increasingly implausible heights, Cruise’s latest transformation is a very different one.

This time, rather than trying to look like the world’s most durable action hero, the goal appears to have been making Tom Cruise disappear entirely.