Tom Cruise films 'Top Gun: Maverick' , 'Mission: Impossible 7' delayed yet again due to COVID-19

Tom Cruise films "Top Gun: Maverick" and  "Mission: Impossible 7" have been delayed yet again as the COVID-19 positive cases are on the rise. Paramount Pictures has delayed the release of 'Top Gun: Maverick' until May 2022 and "Mission: Impossible 7" until September 2022, a spokesman for the ViacomCBS Inc studio said Wednesday. 

While 'Top Gun: Maverick' was to hit the theatres on November 19, it will now debut on the date that had been set for "M:I 7" over next year's Memorial Day weekend. 'Mission Impossible' is likely to release on September 30, 2022. Movie studios have shuffled their schedules as they try to gauge when crowds will return to cinemas. The Delta variant of the coronavirus has disrupted a hoped-for comeback.

Theater chains, including AMC Entertainment, Cineworld Plc and Cinemark Holdings, are counting on blockbusters such as "Top Gun" to help lure audiences back.

Jeff Bock, senior media analyst at Exhibitor Relations Co, called Paramount's decision on "Top Gun" a "smart move." "Paramount needs this to be a big worldwide hit. Global marketplace just isn't there yet," Bock wrote on Twitter.

Earlier, 'Mission: Impossible' makers filed a lawsuit accusing the film's insurance company of failing to pay out for all but one of the costly stoppages. Filming on the action series starring Tom Cruise was delayed four times in Italy, and three times in the United Kingdom between February 2020 and June 2021, said the lawsuit filed by Paramount Pictures in U.S. federal court in California.

The stoppages were caused by positive coronavirus tests among members of the cast or crew, or quarantine or lockdowns imposed in countries where the thriller was being filmed.

The lawsuit accuses Indiana-based Federal Insurance Company of breach of contract, saying it has agreed only to pay out $5 million for the first stoppage. Federal Insurance did not immediately return a request for comment.

Cruise, who is also a producer on the film, lost his temper on the set of "Mission: Impossible 7" in England in December over a breach in COVID protocols, threatening to fire cast and crew members who did not take them seriously.

"Mission: Impossible" is one of the biggest franchises in Hollywood, with 2018's "Mission: Impossible-Fallout" taking more than $791 million at the worldwide box office.
Multiple film and television productions have been disrupted by the pandemic and the cost of testing, consultants and protective equipment has added millions of dollars to their budgets.

Paramount said in the lawsuit that the insurance company argued there was "no evidence that those cast and crew members could not continue their duties, despite being infected with SARS-CoV-2 and posing an undeniable risk to other individuals involved with the production."

Paramount did not say how much the shutdowns had cost but said its losses "far exceeded" the $5 million that Federal had agreed to pay for the first instance of coronavirus in February 2020.

(With input from Agencies)