Manny Jacinto On All His Lines Getting Cut From ‘Top Gun: Maverick’: “It Wasn’t Shocking To Me”

Manny Jacinto is looking back at his time on Top Gun: Maverick and saying he was not shocked his lines got cut from the film.

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The actor stars in Disney+’s The Acolyte , but in 2018, he joined the film starring Tom Cruise and trained for months in actual fighter jets alongside his co-stars, like Glen Powell.

However, when the film was released in 2022, Jacinto was left without much screen time after most of his dialogue was left on the cutting room floor.

“It wasn’t shocking to me,” Jacinto told GQ in a new interview. “There was this sense of where the film was going [on set], like I can see them focusing the camera more on these [other] guys and not taking so much time on our scenes. Fortunately, it still was a great experience — you get to see this huge machine at work, see how Tom Cruise works, and you get to be a small part of this huge franchise.”

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Jacinto said that being mostly cut from Top Gun: Maverick re-energized him adding, “It kind of fuels you because at the end of the day, Tom Cruise is writing stories for Tom Cruise. It’s up to us — Asian Americans, people of color — to be that [for ourselves]. We can’t wait for somebody else to do it. If we want bigger stories out there, we have to make them for ourselves.”

The actor played the role of Lt. Billy “Fritz” Avalone in Top Gun: Maverick . Since appearing in the action film, Jacinto has appeared in Brand New Cherry Flavor , Nine Perfect Strangers, and most recently in the Star Wars universe-set series The Acolyte as The Stranger.

Jacinto is also reportedly circling a role in the Freaky Friday sequel and is part of the cast of the fencing thriller Balestra alongside Cush Jumbo and James Badge Dale.

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