Does Anyone Care if Tom Cruise is Gay?

Bottom line. He could win some...he could lose some.


Perhaps this thread should have been titled differently so that the answers would be closer to what you wanted.

"Do you care if Tom Cruise is gay" is different than What do you think would happen to Tom Cruise's career if he is gay?

I may or may not be notable that Cruise has avoided playing any part construed as even ambiguously gay. Russell Crowe has played outright gay early in his career and Tom Hanks has played gay. That's also a question which seems now to be moot. Will playing a gay character ruin a career?

Ronald Reagan refused to play the character even vaguely gay in "King's Row" even though it was overt in the novel. The script was changed.

LW, We must allow 'artists' to perform/not perform what they consider objectionable parts; the consumer can also choose according to their own subjective interests. I really don't have any difficulty understanding why people have different values.

My daughter said Cruise's best role was the ambiguously gay Lestat--

I have to agree.

He ate it up.

Pitt sucked at his vampirishly gay turn. IMO, naturally.

The fact that he was unable to produce any offspring and then divorced an actress who seeks out roles that allow her to get naked for the camera says something.

In my opinion, if he was gay, and if he came out, a) I expect there would be a lot of chatter about it in the, and most of it would be malicious. Public opinion would be similar. b) As far as the viewers are concerned, I expect he would have little to fear with regard to his box office success. c) In the short run, I think it is possible that risk-averse, big-budget movie producers might react to the chatter, decide to play it safe, and hire someone else for the lead role in Titanic II. But I also think that c) in the long-run, management behavior would adapt to consumer behavior, and Cruise's success would be more or less the same as if he was straight, or as if he didn't come out.

You want to keep in mind that this prediction is coming from the same guy who once told you that Bush was only bluffing about invading Iraq.

When we walked out of David Letterman's first show on our visit to New York City, I told my family "this guy is not going to last!'

Lestat was so ambiguously gay in the movie, you might as well have interpreted that he was playing an androgynous nerd with fangs. I thought Cruise just came off as foolish but Pitt seemed genuinely a Jungian mess, which he repeated in "Twelve Monkeys." Pitt is just hands-down a better actor -- in "Kalifornia" he gave a shuddering performance as the sociopathic killer.

c.i., the part you asked if I missed is the part I quoted from you in the post just before it.

Intrepid, I didn't ask "Do you care if Tom Cruise is Gay." I asked, "Does Anyone Care...", and the poll options are specifically in terms of his career.

<shrug>

Whatever, not a big deal.

I totally agree that Pitt's the better actor.

Thomas, that sounds reasonable enough. I'm not sure, which is part of why I started this thread. I think there would definitely be a big to-do, not sure how it would all shake out at the end. I do think his career would be negatively impacted, but wouldn't be destroyed. (Even if it all happens, this part is of course hard to prove, unless you have a window into alternate universes. If his career goes downhill, who's to say it's definitely about that? Etc.)

I really liked Valpower's points, and agree. I don't personally think that the following he'd gather would cancel out the following he loses -- as Wiz and I have been saying, members of the group he'd supposedly win over already assume as much. Wouldn't really be new to them. Though I guess coming OUT would add luster.

Overall, I don't think the country that is putting up new "Defense of Marriage" proposals every other day is ready to embrace an A-list gay star without a blip. Not sure how big of a blip, but a blip.

(Edit: gains-->loses)

I don't even care if Bush is gay. :wink:

I just hope he doesn't stink up WAR OF THE WORLDS too much!

Bush is only gay with Saudi princes and male horses.

Oooh.

I did want to say Brad Pitt is an infinitely better actor than I had originally thought.

I thought he was awful in Interview with a Vampire, but fabulous in several other outings. He sold me with his performance in Snatch....and he's done much better since then.

(Mental note: watch Snatch again soon.)

I'm old enough to understand that people in the mainstream hollywood film industry have been anxious for many decades less the fan base think they might have some tweak of sexual orientation off of the midline, and anxious for good reason. (I was raised reading Reporter and Variety like other children might have picked up Newsweek.)

I do think it matters for careers, at least re the US public, and that present A list actors won't come out, whenever "present" is, the A list being famously short. I could posit that some B listers will, one of these days.

Personally, I'm sort of curious about some european actors, but of course their personal sexual interests aren't my business.

Cruise is definitely gay as is his "ex",Nicole Kidman.I mean seriously,no one else goes the lenghth of making sure everyone knows who's he's supposedly dating.That Oprah performance was the final evidence

Frankly my dears, It matters not to me one way or another.

And you know soz, I think I have to agree with you. I really haven't cared for him in anything since "Risky Business" either.

His best role since "Risky Business" was in "The Last Samurai" -- I found his performance compelling and believable.

One thing that has to be considered are bisexuals --who either enjoy the best of both worlds or are always schizophrenically on the fence.

LW, I thought Tom Cruise did a decent job in "The Last Samurai" too, but it didn't do that well at the box office. Do you have any ideas why it failed?

I agree, glight, re bisexuals. Perhaps they can tap in to a wide range of emotions in their acting.
(I think more people are bi than admit it. I am a hetero female, but a man I once loved and am still friends with must have been bi, no other explanation, though he later came out as gay. He was and is a very tuned in human. Thinking... he could have been a good actor... I don't mean in our relationship, that must have had some acting but not all the time, but re the theater - he would have been good at it, re brains and empathy and personality.)

I don't know or care whether or not Tom Cruise is gay. I do, however, believe that he is making a fool of himself by his over-exuberance on TV trying to "sell" his feelings for Katey Holmes. Or is he trying to "sell" his upcoming film? Or both?