Tom Cruise filmography Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama and his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. In 1992, he starred opposite Jack Nicholson in the legal drama "A Few Good Men", an adaptation of the Broadway play of the same name also written by Aaron Sorkin. Cruise next appeared in "The Firm" (1993), a film adaptation of the John Grisham legal thriller of the same name, and in the same year also made his directorial debut by directing an episode of the anthology television series "Fallen Angels". Three years later Cruise starred as IMF agent Ethan Hunt in the
Valkyrie (film) partners Paula Wagner and Tom Cruise, who immediately agreed to finance the film in March 2007. Singer invited Tom Cruise to take the lead role, which Cruise accepted. Cruise had been provided a picture of von Stauffenberg, in which the actor noticed a similarity in his profile with the German colonel, drawing him to the role. The director and the screenwriter initially anticipated "Valkyrie" as a "small" film with a budget of under US$20 million and to be completed within several months, but Cruise's interest in playing von Stauffenberg made Singer realize his involvement could broaden the film's publicity and