How 'Rock of Ages' Star Tom Cruise Embraced His Inner Rock God

“Singing a song is very much like acting,” the 49-year-old told reporters at the red carpet premiere of his new film.

Already a movie star, Tom Cruise is adding rock star to his growing repertoire with his role inAdam Shankman’s Rock of Ages.

The three-time Academy Award-nominee successfully found his voice, having no musical background to his credit, with help from the film’s music executive producer, Glee’s Adam Anders.

“The first thing we had to find and discover is what is my voice and what is the voice of the character,” Cruise told reporters on the red carpet at his film’s Hollywood premiere. “It’s not just learning how to sing, I trained for five hours a day for many months, but it was also -- in singing you have opera, you have pop, you’ve got Broadway, and then you’ve got rock. So it was finding out what is that rock voice and then kind of work on the behavior and the wardrobe from that.”

“Scary as hell,” is how Anders described the daunting task of teaching the A-lister how to sing. 

“I went over to his house to hear him sing and I didn’t know what to expect at all,” he said. “He started singing and he didn’t know what he was doing, but his voice was unbelievably powerful and he could sing as high as he wanted to. I was like ‘We’re good! Now we just gotta work.’”

Even the actor was pleasantly surprised with his musical abilities.

“Singing a song is very much like acting, you’re there to tell a story,” he explained. “And once I kind of figured that it out it was easier.”

"To be able to work with Tom Cruise is incredible,” said co-star Malin Ackerman, who plays aRolling Stone reporter in the film. “If you look back at his body of work, he's such an incredible actor so I always feel like whenever you get to work with someone who's been in the business for a while whose really good at their job, they always make you a better actor."