Ben Stiller first conceived the idea for Tropic Thunder while working on the Steven Spielberg World War II drama Empire of the Sun in 1987. At the time, many of Stiller’s colleagues were in boot camps training for roles in war movies and would talk about their experiences as if they were actually in the military. “This sort of self-important, self-involved thing seemed funny to me,” he recalled following Tropic Thunder’s 2008 release.
Twenty years later, Stiller finally figured out how to turn his idea into a movie, but his plans didn’t all work out as he was hoping.
For example, when shooting began, Owen Wilson had already signed on to play the Matthew McConaughey role of Rick “The Pecker” Peck. Wilson dropped out at the last minute due to a reported suicide attempt. Prior to that, Stiller considered playing the slick Hollywood agent himself. He even offered the part to Tom Cruise at one point, who turned it down because he’d already played an agent in Jerry Maguire.
Tom Cruise Didn’t Have Better Things to Do
Speaking of Cruise, he was one actor that Stiller initially had in mind to play the role of Tugg Speedman. As Stiller tells it, he was too nervous to ask Cruise to do it because he figured that Cruise had better things to do.
Another person Stiller took into consideration was Keanu Reeves, but that obviously didn’t work out either. Reeves later did an uncredited voice role on Stiller’s Apple TV series Severance.
Cruise, of course, went on to play studio head Les Grossman in Tropic Thunder, a part that didn’t come about until a few months before filming began. Stiller asked Cruise to take a look at the script as a favor, and Cruise told him that he’d love to be in the movie.
“He said, ‘It’s really funny, but where’s the studio head? It would be really funny to see a studio head in this,’” Stiller recalled of Cruise in a 2008 interview. “For me, that triggered something. It solved a piece of the puzzle. It fulfilled this story point that had been bothering me for eight years.”
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