'Mission: Impossible' star Pom Klementieff says she asked Tom Cruise to kick her in the stomach for real during a fight scene, but 'he wouldn't do it'

• Pom Klementieff spoke to Entertainment Weekly about joining the "Mission: Impossible" franchise.
• Klementieff said she asked Tom Cruise to kick her for real while filming "Dead Reckoning Part One."

"Mission: Impossible" franchise newcomer Pom Klementieff said that she asked Tom Cruise to kick her for real while filming a fight sequence, but the actor refused to do it.

"I kept telling him to just kick me here," Klementieff told Entertainment Weekly in a new interview, referring to her stomach area. "I was squeezing abs. [I said], 'You can just go for it.' He was like, 'No, no, no, no, no.' I was like, 'But it's going to help me!' But he wouldn't do it."

Cruise has been the face of the globe-trotting action franchise, as the character Ethan Hunt, since the first installment hit theaters in May 1996.

"Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One," directed by Christopher McQuarrie, marks the seventh film and the first appearance of Klementieff in the movies.

"Dead Reckoning Part One" centers on Ethan assembling his Impossible Mission Force (IMF) team to prevent a deadly weapon from getting into the wrong hands.

Klementieff, perhaps best known for portraying Mantis in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), plays a character named Paris.

The actor described her to EW as someone who "destroys everything in her path."

"She's a rebel, she's a killer, she's extremely skilled and quite lonely too," she said.

Cruise and Klementieff will be joined by Rebecca Ferguson, Simon Pegg, Vanessa Kirby, Ving Rhames, Hayley Atwell, and more.

"Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One" hits theaters on July 12.