Val Kilmer discusses what it was like filming Top Gun: Maverick with Tom Cruise.

Kilmer’s Iceman helps Maverick with his unique teaching skills, as he struggles with an illness that takes his voice out of the movie. This section of the script is a reflection on Kilmer’s personal life.

The actor revealed that he had been diagnosed with throat cancer in 2017 and has struggled to speak since then. Kilmer, like Iceman, communicates primarily through writing.

Cruise and Kosinski knew that Kilmer’s return in “Top Gun: Maverick” was crucial. 

Kosinski stated that “Obviously [we] spent quite a bit of time on this scene, writing it and getting ready.” I wasn’t sure how it would work. It’s an amazing scene. It was shot in Los Angeles, in a beautiful house that is located in a park. It was very special to see Val and Tom back together on the screen.

Cruise’s biggest movie launch was “Top Gun Maverick,” which brought in $151 million during Memorial Day weekend.

Paramount’s film was delayed several times by the coronavirus pandemic. It now holds the record of the second-best Memorial Day opening of any time, behind Johnny Depp’s “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” which made $153 million in 2007.