Tom Cruise: World’s biggest star, with a daredevil streak

LOS ANGELES, United States — A diminutive, aging action hero who is clean-cut but controversial, world-famous yet utterly secretive: Tom Cruise’s reign as the world’s top movie star has long defied time, expectations and — when stunts are involved — gravity.

The daredevil star, who famously insists on doing his own leaps, chases and plunges, is widely predicted to perform a death-defying but top-secret stunt on the roof of the Stade de France for the Paris Olympics closing ceremony on Sunday.

It would be just the latest high-adrenaline feat for a 62-year-old actor who rode a motorbike off a cliff for last year’s “Mission: Impossible” installment, and still runs rings around Hollywood’s young pretenders when it comes to action sequences.

Cruise first emerged as one of the bratty young stars of 1980s Hollywood with “The Outsiders” and “Risky Business.”

The fiercely intense and ambitious actor embarked on one of the all-time Hollywood hot streaks with hits like “Top Gun,” “Cocktail,” “Rain Man,” “A Few Good Men” and “Jerry Maguire.”

Despite standing at just 5′7″, he successfully pivoted toward action films with 1996’s “Mission: Impossible.”

Controversy enveloped Cruise in the mid-2000s, particularly over his links to Scientology and his love life.

But while rival stars of his generation have waned, Cruise still churns out action blockbusters in which he — not any superhero or franchise — is the big draw.

His biggest hit came just two years ago with “Top Gun: Maverick.”

Cruise flew his own planes for the film, skimming dangerously low above the Earth’s surface and enduring intense G-forces.

Cruise “always wanted to go lower,” director Joseph Kosinski told AFP.

“I guarantee you’ll never see anything quite like it ever again... he was always pushing.”

Born Thomas Cruise Mapother in New York on July 3, 1962, Cruise had an unsettled childhood. His father left home when he was 11. Cruise is reported to have attended 15 schools in 12 years.

At one stage, he considered becoming a Catholic priest, but got the acting bug after a high school production of the musical “Guys and Dolls.”

His film debut came in 1981 romance “Endless Love.” But “Risky Business” (1983) — in which Cruise famously cavorted semi-naked while lip-syncing to “Old Time Rock and Roll” — marked him as a future star.