Impossible is like giving birth, says Rebecca Ferguson

27 May 2023

Rebecca Ferguson has compared shooting a ‘Mission Impossible’ film to giving birth.

Rebecca Ferguson compares making a movie to giving birth

The 39-year-old actress – who has a 15-year-old son, Isac, with former boyfriend Ludwig Hallberg and a five-year-old daughter, Sage, with her husband Rory – reprises her role as Ilsa Faust in ‘Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One’ and though she admitted making the movies can be tough, she always wants to get involved again.

Asked if it was a tough shoot, she told Radio Times magazine: “It always is. Literally, from day one, I said, ‘It’s like giving birth… it hurts!’

“But once you’ve done it, you kind of want to do it again.”

Rebecca enjoys the fact director Christopher McQuarrie and lead star Tom Cruise encourage the cast to “wing it” and improvise with their dialogue.

She continued: “And it’s such a different way of filming, the way that Tom and McQ work.

“And not working that way now makes me miss it.

“We don’t have the scripts… You’re not really preparing for a role. You know your role. You wing it when you’re there.

“And you just make it work. And they just hit it out of the ballpark every time.”

Rebecca knows she’s done good work when she can “step outside” of herself.

She said: “When I act in a scene, if it’s a good scene and it’s well directed, and I’m working alongside someone who’s good, I step outside of my own being and the scene gets to live it’s own life, right?

“That’s what we’re working towards.”

The Swedish star has always found Tom to be a reassuring presence.

She said: “I remember the first time I worked with him [on 2015’s ‘Rogue Nation’] I got a beautiful gift from him.

“He wrote a note that said, ‘Thank you for taking this first leap with me.’

“It was the first shot of the first day. Because he knew that I was nervous.”