Looks like Paramount’s mission to finish the long-delayed shoot for Mission: Impossible 7 is proving…not possible. Or at least, extremely difficult, as production on the seventh installment of the Mission: Impossible series has come to a halt after at least one member of the production tested positive for COVID-19.
Per The Hollywood Reporter, filming on Mission: Impossible 7 will shut down for 14 days while those who came in contact with the member of the production who tested positive for COVID-19 will self-isolate. It’s not confirmed how many people tested positive.
“We have temporarily halted production on Mission: Impossible 7 until June 14th, due to positive coronavirus test results during routine testing. We are following all safety protocols and will continue to monitor the situation,” a statement from the production reads.
This news comes after production on the seventh Mission: Impossible movie seemed to be going swimmingly, with new photos from the set and an Empire Magazine feature that went into great detail about how the cast and crew worked to make the production as safe as possible. No terrifying robots necessary. Empire Magazine explained, “There was social distancing, there were masks, there were bubbles of crew members – one make-up artist for every two actors, plus heads of departments staying in hotel rooms on their own, driving to set, shooting the scene and then returning to the hotel until needed – and pods of five people, ready to quarantine if anyone within one contracted the virus.”
But it seems like those precautions — and a blistering scolding from star Tom Cruise back in December — could not stop at least one positive COVID-19 test.
Mission: Impossible 7 has struggled to wrap production since the start of the pandemic. Filming in Italy was first shut down in February 2020 as the pandemic brought a halt to film productions across the world. Shooting didn’t resume in earnest until July 2020 in the U.K., after which the production went to Norway and back to Italy. But things in Italy ground to a halt in October 2020 when 12 people on set tested positive for COVID-19. With the many stops and starts to Mission: Impossible 7, director Christopher McQuarrie was forced to scrap initial plans to shoot Mission: Impossible 7 and Mission: Impossible 8 back-to-back.
It’s unclear if Mission: Impossible 7 – which is written and directed by McQuarrie and stars Cruise, Ving Rhames, Henry Czerny, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, Angela Bassett, Frederick Schmidt, Hayley Atwell, Pom Klementieff, Shea Whigham, Esai Morales, Rob Delaney, Charles Parnell, Indira Varma, Mark Gatiss, and Cary Elwes – can still meet its theatrical release date on May 27, 2022.
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