After multiple well-received turns in Marvel projects, the actor steps into her biggest role yet. “I was finally given the trust and the platform.”
In 2013, when Hayley Atwell took the stage for Trafalgar Studios’ production of The Pride, she had no idea that future co-architect of the Mission: Impossible franchise, Christopher “McQ” McQuarrie, was in attendance. Atwell had already read for McQ and Tom Cruise’s 2012 film, Jack Reacher, but on this particular occasion, McQ was so gobsmacked by her live performance that he took the actor out to dinner and stated his intentions to write a role for her someday. Well, someday became 2019, as McQ and Cruise needed a new leading lady to play Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One’s master thief, Grace.
Atwell has waited over 17 years for an opportunity like this in a blockbuster film. Yes, she’s played the fan-favorite Peggy Carter at least a half-dozen times in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but her big screen opportunities were almost always in service of another character’s story, that of Steve Rogers/Captain America. In Dead Reckoning Part One, Atwell is finally at the center of a tentpole feature, and that is evident when Grace gets the better of Cruise’s Ethan Hunt multiple times during the first half of the film.
“I was finally given the trust and the platform … to show more range and to show more emotional depth in a franchise or something of this size, which I hadn’t been afforded before,” Atwell tells The Hollywood Reporter in a conversation conducted ahead of the SAG-AFTRA strike. “And so I have this eternal gratitude to Tom and to McQ, who provided the resources and the support system every day on set so that I could thrive. It’s been a deliverance of a long time coming. After 17 years in this industry, I’ve finally been able to do something at this level, with this quality of filmmaking, and I’d never been afforded that before.”
In a production filled with indelible moments, Atwell will never forget a rainy day in Rome, where she drifted during a car chase, all while Cruise was handcuffed to her.
“There’s about 20 minutes of footage of us [drifting] over and over again,” Atwell says. “And then Tom led a round of applause from the crew, and McQ said, ‘Tom put his life in your hands just then and he wouldn’t have allowed you to do that had he not believed that you could look after him, too.’ So they’re never short on their praise for when actors come in and deliver for them. That’s a moment I’ll never forget.”
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