Tom Cruise, Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg knock heads in Mission: Impossible III.

Ving Rhames might be the last guy in the world -- or at least in the regular cast of the Mission: Impossible franchise -- to criticize, carve up or gossip about superstar Tom Cruise.

"I know Tom Cruise," Rhames says in a phone interview this week while he is on the run with both film work and promotional duties in Los Angeles. "And a lot of times, things you might read in the media about someone come from people who don't really know the man. So honestly, brother, I give that no energy at all."

Rhames, who plays Cruise's sidekick and fellow secret agent Luther Stickell in the three Mission: Impossible movies, says the fuss about Cruise's personal life is blown out of proportion in the media.

Especially now that he and girlfriend Katie Holmes have a new daughter, Suri, after a birthwatch that turned into a media circus.

"You know, Tom's life on a day-to-day level doesn't affect my life," Rhames offers. "You understand, just like your life doesn't affect him and my life doesn't affect yours. He is really just another human being and that is how I treat him -- as a friend and as a fellow human being. I think most actors, most artists, most celebrities, just want to be treated as regular human beings. It is the media that makes them bigger than life. But Tom is very much down to earth."

That could be argued, of course. Even Rhames seems to contradict the "regular" tag on Cruise when he talks about how his own career over the past decade has intersected with that of Cruise.

"I've been fortunate enough to work with Tom and see his work and experience his growth as an artist over a 10-year period on a personal level," Rhames says. "Not too many people can say that -- that they've worked with, really, the No. 1 box-office star and gotten to know him and seen his growth."

We have seen Rhames' own growth. While he made his screen debut on TV in 1985 in Go Tell It On The Mountain and went on to roles in such productions as Patty Hearst (as Cinque), Casualties Of War (as Lt. Reilly) and the quirky David Mamet piece Homicide (as Randolph), it was his dynamic performance in Pulp Fiction that exploded his career into stardom and even notoriety. Quentin Tarantino cast him as the doomed drug dealer Marsellus Wallace, tied him up in the basement and rape was never the same in the cinema again.

Two years later, in 1996, Rhames showed up in Brian De Palma's original Mission: Impossible movie as a computer expert who aids and abets Cruise's spy exploits.

He reprised the role in John Woo's Mission: Impossible II and is back again in J.J. Abrams' third instalment. The Woo picture was savaged but the Abrams version is designed to revive the franchise as something more than just a series of outrageous action stunts with an impossible plot.

Rhames says the pace of the sequels is perfect: For him, for Cruise and for the franchise.

"I think the beautiful thing is that you have more quality time to put into it. No offence to any actors who played any of the Bond characters but, in general, their careers have not been like Tom Cruise's. Sean Connery is probably the one who came the closest but, still, he was doing a Bond film every two years.

"So that didn't give the actor much time to do anything else. With Tom Cruise, you can look at things from Born On The Fourth Of July to Collateral to The Last Samurai. His films are a little more well-rounded in the same time period."

(Rhames' chronology is a little off: Born On The Fourth dates back to 1989).

Mission: Impossible III is also more substantial than the usual summer fare, Rhames maintains. "We accomplished, I think, a little more than a summer blockbuster action film.

"The fact that you get to know a little more about Tom's character on a personal level (he gets married and is wife is then in jeopardy) helps draw you in a little more to the character. That's what I was very proud of with this piece. He had a relationship and not a 'sexual-ship' with someone. And it's very real."

As for his own role, Luther Stickell remains aloof and all business, but Rhames is proud on a different level: He is an African-American actor in a recurring role in a huge mainstream movie series. "I look at the Mission: Impossible franchise and I say, basically, very few franchises have an African-American character."

The Lethal Weapon series was a notable exception, he notes. So the profile it brings helps him immeasurably, Rhames says.

"Any actor can tell you that doing a blockbuster like this, it helps you get other things done. That's been my experience."

The things he wants to do are more personal, intimate projects, especially as a producer who specializes in African-American themed stories.

One key project, 3/5 Of A Man, is now in post-production for release in 2007. It is the story of the Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia in 1831.

Rhames has a role and also produced the film in a hands-on way, helping director Akosua Busia cast and get the film shot.

Rhames, who turns 47 on May 12, says he is looking past his own life now that he has two young children with second wife Deborah Reed.

Spurred by his faith in God, he says he now asks himself the question: "What is my legacy when I leave this planet? Outside of people who knew me, loved me -- your family, your kids, your wife -- it's your work, you see. This work will be here when I'm long gone -- on DVD or something new by then.

"So my thing now is: 'What does Ving Rhames stand for?' The films that I produce, they're all films with some kind of message about the human condition or the human experience."

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