Glen Powell's Secret Obsession with Aviation

[feet clacks]

All right, this is a plane and I love them.

I'm Glen Powell.

I'm obsessed with aviation.

[plane whirs]

From when I was probably eight years old

to when I graduated high school,

I had a poster of the Blue Angels on my wall.

I went to an air show of the Blue Angels.

I got all those pilots to sign my posters.

I always loved aviation.

And then, you get cast in a movie like Top Gun,

it's like as cool as it gets.

[rock music] [plane whooshes]

So this is the F-14 Tomcat.

This is the plane from the original Top Gun.

This plane is still flyable,

but no longer really in use with the Navy.

One of my favorite little facts

is that you have your squadron right on the tail.

And when I was designing Hangman,

when I was doing Top Gun,

I was gonna put this on my helmet.

And then I put it on my helmet,

Jerry Bruckheimer was like,

That looks like Pirates of the Caribbean.

You cannot put that on your helmet.

That's a different movie.

[plane whooshes]

I got my pilot's license.

I was shooting Top Gun Maverick.

Maverick, also known as Tom Cruise.

He shows up and leaves set

in his own little plane every day, a little P-51.

A little World War II fighter plane.

It's like immaculate,

but it's just the coolest look when you leave set,

you just take off into the sunset.

Like you want to be a part of that.

After I wrapped up the movie,

I had probably more F-18 hours than any civilian out there,

which is kind of crazy.

Like when I went to go get my pilot's license,

the guy opened up my log book

and usually you see like a,

you know, a Cessna 172 hours or whatever.

And I had a extra 300, 172, you know, L-39.

And there was like F-18, F-18, F-18, F-18,

which like no other civilian gets to do is fly the F-18.

When you're on a movie like Top Gun, like it's infectious.

I find this in anything I'm ever doing

is when you're surrounded by the best,

you can't help but just get inspired

and want to know more and want to be a part of it.

When you walk around the world

and you're part of the aviation community,

you look up in the sky, most people see a plane.

They're like, There's a plane up there.

And then, now I'm like, Oh, what is that?

What are they flying?

[gentle music]

As a pilot, you have to get used to disappointing people

'cause it's not always safe to fly.

You don't want to fly

when you are not feeling great

or when the weather is not there.

And if you have a bunch of friends that want to go to Napa

or Vegas or go play golf in Scottsdale or whatever,

it's like you, you should never force it

when something happens with your plane that's unexpected,

it definitely gets real up there.

And I think it's important to realize your mortality.

You really gotta know your plane.

The more you fly,

the more calm you feel in those situations.

And I feel that flying for me is like meditative.

I feel like in my job and my life,

it's sometimes hard to quiet the noise.

There's just so much happening all the time

that there's something really peaceful for me about flying,

just being up there listening to some music

and flying where I want to go.

[gentle music continues]

[Pilot] Crew Victor's primary radio, clear GTC?

[Announcer] Clear!