Pat McAfee sought acting coaching from Bradley Cooper and advice from Tom Cruise while preparing for his first film role in Peter Berg’s The Mosquito Bowl, the director revealed at the movie’s AFI Fest premiere in Los Angeles on October 22.
The ESPN personality plays a Marine drill instructor in the World War II drama, which stars Nicholas Galitzine, Bill Skarsgård, Ray Nicholson and Tom Francis. His preparation included spending a week at the Marine Corps recruit training site in Parris Island, South Carolina.
Berg told The Hollywood Reporter that he initially questioned whether McAfee’s ESPN schedule would allow him to take the assignment seriously. He subsequently discovered that the broadcaster had been consulting established actors.
Berg said, “He wanted to learn how to do it and he did.”
McAfee traced the casting opportunity to Timothée Chalamet’s 2024 appearance on College GameDay, which he said attracted Hollywood viewers while the film was casting. An inquiry about playing the drill instructor followed shortly afterward. He also credited Ari Emanuel with encouraging him to consider acting.
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McAfee discussed the premiere on the October 23 episode of his own show, recounting the red-carpet experience and the film’s football and combat sequences.
The football connection extends beyond McAfee’s casting. According to Netflix’s production notes, the film adapts Buzz Bissinger’s nonfiction book and follows four college football stars who enlist in the Marines after Pearl Harbor. A game played by servicemen before the Battle of Okinawa supplies the film’s title and a link to the lives they left behind.
Berg previously directed the 2004 adaptation of Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights and later helped develop its television version. Their latest collaboration moves from high school football in Texas to athletes confronting wartime service in the Pacific.
Galitzine plays John McLaughry, Skarsgård plays Bob Bauman, Nicholson portrays Tony Butkovich and Francis plays David Schreiner. The production filmed in Australia, including Queensland and northern New South Wales, with locations standing in for military training grounds and the Pacific theater.
Netflix’s account of the production describes extensive preparation and practical effects. Galitzine said the cast performed much of the physical work themselves, with limited use of stunt doubles, while Francis described the shoot as his first experience making a film.
The Mosquito Bowl opens in select theaters on October 30 and begins streaming on Netflix on November 25.
