I don’t know how many times various outlets are going to make references to Brad Pitt’s “midlife crisis style” or “midlife crisis makeover.” Brad Pitt is 61 years old, that is NOT midlife. I’m calling it a “last-quarter-life crisis.” And yes, it is a crisis. Brad was in NYC over the weekend for the junket and promotional work for F1. He brought Ines de Ramon to NYC and they stepped out several times, with Brad wearing a series of hilariously bad ensembles. I really wasn’t expecting denim palazzo pants with a ill-fitted crushed velvet jacket. But here we are.

Meanwhile, there’s been so much talk about how F1 is basically a Tom Cruise movie without Tom, and there’s been a good deal of comparing-and-contrasting Tom and Brad, who famously did not get along when they worked on Interview with a Vampire. The comparisons haven’t gone well for Brad, by the way – even the people who worked on F1 (producers and director Joseph Kosinski) speak wistfully about how Tom always did as much as his own daredevil stuntwork as possible, while Brad comes across as a dilettante for the most part. Well, someone asked Brad if he would work with Tom again:

Brad Pitt would be open to reteaming with friend and fellow industry heavyweight Tom Cruise — but he’s got one stipulation in mind. The two movie stars, who appeared onscreen together for 1994’s Interview with the Vampire, used to race go-karts together after filming, Pitt told E! News, adding that it was “so sweet” of the Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning star to praise the upcoming Joseph Kosinski-helmed F1.

When asked what it would take to collaborate again, Pitt responded, “Well, I’m not gonna hang my ass off airplanes and sh– like that, so when he does something again that’s on the ground.”

The two-time Oscar winner’s sentiments come as no surprise to anyone familiar with Cruise’s penchant for death-defying stunts. Kosinski, who directed Cruise in Top Gun: Maverick most recently, noted the difference in the two performers’ approach to the art of stunts in a May F1 feature with GQ.

“Tom always pushes it to the limit, but at the same time is super capable and very skilled,” he said. “They both have the natural talent for driving. But yeah, I could see Tom maybe scaring us a little bit more.”

Meanwhile, the movie’s action-vehicle supervisor, Graham Kelly, added, “We’d have had a crash. Tom pushes it to the limit. I mean really to the limit. That terrifies me. I mean, I’ve done loads of Mission: Impossibles with Tom and it’s the most stressful experience for someone like me building cars for him, doing stunts with him. Whereas Brad listens and he knows his abilities, and I think he’d be the first to say, ‘Yeah, I’m not going to do that.’”

[From Deadline]

Granted, it’s perfectly reasonable for a 60-something man to say “I’m not interested in doing those stunts anymore.” But yeah… Tom Cruise continues to come across as more authentic than Brad, which is fascinating to me. How Tom and Brad pap-stroll is also fascinating – like, Tom was being seen regularly with Ana de Armas when he was promoting the latest MI, but everyone insisted that he was mentoring her… and people believed it. Meanwhile, Brad is stuck in ‘90s purgatory, pap-strolling with his much younger girlfriend… and no one believes any of it.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.