A newly surfaced video shows Tom Cruise bursting out in laughter as he recalled cutting off a passenger’s oxygen during a high-altitude flight.
Cruise is back in the spotlight after raking in the dough for his movie Top Gun Maverick, which shattered records across the globe. A resurfaced video clip from a 1999 appearance on the “Late Late Show with David Letterman” shows Cruise keeling over with laughter when retelling the story involving a passenger on his plane, even after Letterman called him out for the behavior.
Cruise told Letterman he turned off the oxygen mask of a passenger on his plane while traveling at a high altitude during a flight. Cruise alleged there wasn’t enough oxygen in the aircraft to fly at the desired altitude, and that he decided turning off the passenger’s mask was worth it.
“One time we were flying to Colorado, and I was flying the airplane. We had to go on oxygen, and the winds were better at a higher altitude so we climbed up and I realized that we couldn’t stay at that altitude if I had to descend because I didn’t have enough oxygen,” Cruise told Letterman.
“I had a passenger in the back so we figured out you know me and the co-pilot that if we turned off the oxygen of the back guy then we could make it in this altitude,” Cruise said amid bursts of uncontrollable laughter. (RELATED: ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ Earns More Than $550 Million Globally)
Cruise could not complete his sentences, because he was laughing so intensely. He also joked at the manner in which the male passenger reacted to the lack of oxygen.
“He was very quiet and he fell asleep. He fell asleep. He slept the whole way,” Cruise said, claiming the passenger woke up confused and disoriented.
“‘My hands are tingling, I slept the whole way. Must have been the way I was laying,'” Cruise recalled the passenger saying.
Letterman seemed visibly shocked, and called Cruise out for putting the passenger in danger.
“Looking at it from another direction isn’t that attempted manslaughter? You just turned a guy’s oxygen off. You’re lucky you’re not doing time, for the love of God,” Letterman said.
Cruise continued laughing, unaffected by Letterman’s criticism.