Steven Spielberg Defended Tom Cruise After Actor’s Embarrassing Couch-Jumping Incident, Claimed “He was being punished” By the Media
The 20-year-old dispute between actor Tom Cruise, one of the most outstanding and gifted performers, and master director Steven Spielberg reportedly came to an end at the Academy Awards lunch. The pair collaborated on the 2005 film War of the Worlds, which was based on H. G. Wells’ 1898 novel of the same name. It was written by David Koepp and Josh Friedman.
After its release, the film received favorable reviews from both the public and the critics, who praised it for successfully capturing the thrilling and suspenseful elements mentioned in the book while also adding modernizations that were appropriate for the circumstances while keeping the two in line. Even before that, Steven Spielberg praised Tom Cruise after his movie Top Gun: Maverick did exceptionally well at the box office, so why were the duo in a quarrel? Let’s find out.
Also read: Tom Cruise’s Mission Impossible 7 Earns $71,000,000 After a Lawsuit Settlement
Steven Spielberg defended Tom Cruise in his ‘couch-jumping’ incident despite being unhappy
Filmmaker Steven Spielberg, who directed 2005’s War of the Worlds which starred Tom Cruise, had been upset with the actor because of his infamous couch-jumping incident when he appeared on Oprah Winfrey‘s show and had jumped on the couch and then ran backstage to get Katie Holmes before declaring that he loved her. The director still went ahead to defend his actor.
Spielberg said to Newsweek via CNN at the time:
“Not at Tom, but at the press for making such a big deal out of a kind of small thing. Tom lost his cool because he was deliriously happy, and now he was being punished for his public display of happiness.”
The filmmaker revealed that he had faced the same situation with the actor when he told him about his then-wife Katie Holmes. He said, “What Tom did on Oprah was exactly what Tom did with me when he first told me about Katie Holmes. But the press didn’t like the way Tom bared his soul.”
The filmmaker was also upset with the fact that the actor had hardly talked about the movie he was supposed to promote on the show as it went on to cost him $30 million in box office takings.
Tom Cruise believes that the editing of Oprah Winfrey’s show made him look bad
According to Seth Rogen’s Yearbook via Business Insider, Tom Cruise, who hadn’t spoken about the incident since the controversy started, wrote that the Mission Impossible actor believes that the editing of the Oprah Winfrey show interview when the infamous couch incident took place was edited in such a way that looked like he was losing his mind.
Rogen shared, “‘Well, yeah, they’re making it seem like I’m losing my mind’. There’s a coordinated effort to make it appear that way.’” On asked why he believed that the media was after him or trying to paint him in a bad light, the actor said to Rogen, who wrote,
“’Because my exposure of their fraud has cost them SO much money that they’re desperate. They’re scrambling and they’re doing everything they can to discredit me so I won’t hurt sales anymore’. They edited it to make it look so much worse than it was. They do that all the time. You should see what they do to my friend Louis Farrakhan!”
Tom Cruise believes he was misunderstood
During his interview with Pop Sugar via The Things, the actor whose infamous couch incident had stirred up controversy mentioned that even though he believes that he was partially at fault with the way he came off or expressed being in love with his then-wife Katie Holmes, he still believes that the media had tried to portray him in a different light which makes the audience confused about his character.
He said,
“I feel like things have definitely been misunderstood, and there are things I could have done better. But then there’s also that world where you go, ‘Oh, it’s been spun to such an extent that. That’s a truth also.’ Knowing when and where to communicate, I think that’s important. A lot of times I was nervous giving interviews. Or I sometimes wasn’t as comfortable about things. And I realized that it’s okay. There’s stuff you have to just let go of. I just have to do the best I can.”
Tom Cruise’s recent release Mission Impossible 7 will be available to purchase on digital platforms starting October 10. It will soon start streaming on Paramount+.
Source: CNN
