Fan or Foe?

Let me take a minute to defend a stranger that everyone else seems to know intimately. His name is Tom Cruise. I am a fan of his acting and his movies, yet, it's become harder to find people that feel the same way. I try to open conversations about some of his movies and I'm met with overt hostility. "I hate that guy" or "He's too crazy for me" are too of the most common reactions I receive. Whenever I hear someone tell me he "hates" Tom Cruise, I always like picturing Cruise stealing the guy's parking space at Target. This seems the type of thing to warrant such disdain for a person they've never met.

I'll admit, I don't always agree with actors. Mel Gibson is a good example. But his drunken, slur filled tirades didn't stop me from seeing Apocolypto or admitting Braveheart is a fantastic film. For whatever reason, people can't separate Tom Cruise from the characters he plays in films as they can other people. I have never heard anyone react to Mel Gibson movies the way they do to Tom Cruise films. This surprises me. Mel Gibson is quoted as saying, "Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world." Tom Cruise called Matt Lauer "glib".

Now many who think Tom Cruise is "crazy", think so because of two things. One, being his belief in Scientology, which I really know too little about to share any opinions on, though I've rarely heard people comfortable with openly disliking someone for their religion. So that leaves the other "crazy" moment that occurred on Oprah, when Cruise announced he was fist-pumping-couch-jumping in love with Katie Holmes. Granted, out of context, if you were to watch clips of his appearance you might have thought he went a little overboard. But I was watching it while it aired, and it was nothing but fantastic television. Cruise is a showman. If you listen to the crowd in any of those clips, it's not as if you hear them all whispering, "holy shit, I think he's lost it". You hear them screaming with wild abandon.

I'm as avid a reader of Us Weekly covers as any grocery shopper, but one has to admit there's quite a bit of speculation going on there. I was in a store just last week and saw a tabloid cover that said something like, "A Glimpse into the Twisted Life of Suri Cruise". There was a bulleted list of things that made her childhood "twisted". The third on the list was "Still using a pacifier at age Four". My immediate reaction was to call the police. But, while looking for a phone, I realized that cops shop at grocery stores and someone was probably on it.

I know it sounds silly to defend someone I don't know, but I guess that's what's so interesting about celebrities. We become attached to them, so much so, we might lose touch on our relationships with them. To assume I know Tom Cruise any more intimately than I do his character in Jerry McGuire would be a mistake. Just as I feel letting a tabloid cover sway my opinion on a movie I've never seen might be a bit "crazy".