Tom Cruise Helped John Boyega Land His STAR WARS Role as Finn

Before John Boyega became Finn, ditched the First Order, and found himself caught up in a galaxy-wide war, he was a young London actor with about $400 to his name. Then Tom Cruise gave his career a nice little push.

Boyega recently shared the story of how Cruise helped put him on Star Wars director J.J. Abrams’ radar, and it all started because the Mission: Impossible star happened to be a fan of Attack the Block.

At the time, Boyega was still trying to establish himself in Hollywood. His breakout performance as Moses in the 2011 sci-fi action film had earned him attention, but major studio roles hadn’t started rolling in yet.

Boyega crossed paths with Cruise and Abrams while working on the third Mission: Impossible project. Cruise recognized him from Attack the Block and made a point of telling him exactly what he thought of his performance.

Boyega recalled the encounter at Rebel Scum Con: “And Tom Cruise stopped and said, dude, I watched you in Attack the Block. I’m there, like, where do you go from there? And I go, yeah, thank you, Mr. Cruise, Tom Cruise, sir, yeah, thank you. And he goes, no, you’re really good. And he turns to J.J., and he goes, you have to put him in something.”

Getting an endorsement from Tom Cruise directly in front of J.J. Abrams is a pretty great way to make an impression.

Boyega was also in a much different place financially at the time. He described just how uncertain things were for him: “…Imagine you’re just from London, you’ve got like $400 in your account, you can’t afford the Airbnb cost for the next day…”

Then, a few months after his encounter with Cruise and Abrams, the phone rang. Boyega explained: “Months later, I got a call and said, you’ve got your first audition for a space movie to audition for the role of Boy One.”

That mysterious “space movie” turned out to be Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and “Boy One” ultimately became Finn, the former stormtrooper who escapes the First Order and gets pulled into the Resistance alongside Poe Dameron and Rey.

The Force Awakens turned Boyega into an international star. Finn quickly became one of the central characters of the new Star Wars trilogy, with Boyega returning for Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.

His career took off from there, and in 2016 he won the BAFTA Rising Star Award. It’s impossible to know exactly how things would have played out without Cruise speaking up, but his recommendation clearly came at a pretty great moment.

That’s a pretty cool assist from Tom Cruise.