Hollywood action director Casey O'Neill —the man behind Tom Cruise’s gravity-defying stunts in Mission Impossible, Top Gun: Maverick and many other smash hits— has worked with Shah Rukh Khan for the action sequences in Pathaan, the upcoming film’s director Siddharth Anand said in a statement.

“When one sets out to make the spectacle action film of India with one of the all-time biggest heroes of our country, you need to have a champion team that is unified in the vision. Thankfully, we got an A-team that came together to push the visual envelope with Pathaan and I was delighted to have someone like Casey O’Neill, who has extensively worked with Tom Cruise, to be by our side,” said Siddharth.

Emmy award-nominated Casey, regarded as one of the best action directors in Hollywood, is the brain behind Tom Cruise’s stunts in many films and has also worked with Marvel Studios and Steven Spielberg.

About Casey, Siddharth said, “He brings in a wealth of experience and he immediately bought into the idea of creating edge-of-the-seat action for Pathaan that could match what he’s done back home in Hollywood. What Casey has created in Pathaan, is simply mind-boggling. You will have to see the film for that because we aren’t going to disclose any details from the film till it releases in theatres on 25 Jan.”

Casey is also a seven-time Screen Actors Guild awards nominee and three-time Taurus World Stunt Awards Winner for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Captain America Winter Soldier and Mission Impossible Ghost Protocol. His skills have also earned him membership to the Academy of motion picture arts and sciences and to the elite Brand X Action Specialists.

Produced by Yash Raj Films chief Aditya Chopra, the action extravaganza, Pathaan, is part of Chopra’s ambitious spy universe. The film also stars Deepika Padukone and John Abraham.

Pathaan is set to release on Jan 25, 2023 in Hindi, Tamil and Telugu.