{"id":627046,"date":"2026-09-17T02:04:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T02:04:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/627046\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T02:04:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T02:04:11","slug":"tom-cruise-launches-oscar-campaign-with-so-what-gq-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/627046\/","title":{"rendered":"Tom Cruise Launches Oscar Campaign With So-What GQ Interview"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Tom Cruise buckled in for Alejandro G. I\u00f1\u00e1rritu\u2019s Legendary\/Warner Bros. <\/a>adventure \u201cDigger<\/a>,\u201d shot in 35mm VistaVision by three-time Oscar winner Emmanuel \u201cChivo\u201d Lubezki, Oscar watchers perked up. After all, I\u00f1\u00e1rritu won his second Best Director Oscar for \u201cThe Revenant,\u201d and Leonardo DiCaprio landed his first Oscar after \u201cBirdman\u201d took home Best Picture, Director, and Original Screenplay. And Cruise, 64, is overdue for an acting Oscar. Nominated for three acting and one producing Oscar over his storied career, he also took home an Honorary Academy Award last year.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been a while since Cruise was in actual contention. At the height of his fame and charisma, his last nomination (for Supporting Actor) was 26 years ago, for his vivid role as a chauvinist motivational speaker in Paul Thomas Anderson\u2019s \u201cMagnolia.\u201d Playing a callow agent in Cameron Crowe\u2019s sports rom-com \u201cJerry Maguire\u201d and wheelchair veteran Ron Kovic in Oliver Stone\u2019s \u201cBorn on the Fourth of July\u201d brought him two Best Actor nods, in 1997 and 1990.<\/p>\n

\"LA<\/a> \"'Stuffed'\"<\/a> <\/p>\n

What happened? Since then, Cruise has chosen another career route, preferring to burnish his commercial bona fides with such franchises as \u201cTop Gun\u201d and \u201cMission: Impossible.\u201d (He\u2019s prepping another Jerry Bruckheimer franchise return with the upcoming \u201cDays of Thunder\u201d sequel.)<\/p>\n

So what kicked off his Oscar campaign? A mealy-mouthed, so-what GQ feature interview,<\/a> the first sit-down Cruise has done with a magazine in years. He\u2019s still all work, all film<\/a>, all the time. The video features him and his director. And the photos, one of them shirtless, show off his manly physique. (Presumably, as has been the case for some time, Scientology was off the table.) I tracked his 2022 MasterClass Conversation at Cannes<\/a> with Didier Allouch, which is one reason I\u2019ll never land a Cruise interview.<\/p>\n

\"Digger\"\u2018Digger\u2019 Warner Bros.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe mastery on display was Tom Cruise\u2019s unflagging ability to reveal nothing,\u201d I wrote. \u201cTom Cruise<\/a> would rather be boring than lose control of an interview. He\u2019s learned from his aberrations, whether jumping on the couch or advising people not to take prescription drugs. And so, his participation in a May 18 MasterClass Conversation at Cannes<\/a> could have been an extension of Paramount\u2019s 68-page press kit for \u2018Top Gun: Maverick<\/a>.’\u201d<\/p>\n

If I were in town, I\u2019d be able to see Cruise do Q&As on September 27 and 29. I\u2019ll see \u201cDigger\u201d on the Warners lot on September 19, while the New York press is invited to weekend morning screenings as well. So far, Cruise is not scheduled for any Q&As in New York. Cruise will fly to London for the Royal Premiere on September 22. Flying him anywhere is an expensive enterprise. In the past, he has been known to deploy two private planes: the first to deliver his luggage to his hotel, so everything is set up by the time the second arrives.<\/p>\n

Academy voters may be well disposed toward Cruise. \u201cThis is a movie star playing a character role,\u201d said one veteran Oscar campaigner. \u201cHe relishes it. Did it in \u2018Tropic Thunder\u2019 with the best reviews. He\u2019s having a good time. At that age it makes sense: \u2018I can do other stuff besides just climb cliffs.\u2019 Don\u2019t think anybody holds it against him he made silly action pictures. They generated box office and respect.\u201d<\/p>\n

The question is how far Cruise will extend himself to promote this $160-million so-called comedy. The trailer shows the actor in full-makeup character mode as a brash entrepreneur who has somehow caused the end of the world and is trying to fix his mistake. It looks very \u201cDr. Strangelove.\u201d While I\u00f1\u00e1rritu can craft commercial entertainment, it\u2019s hard to tell where this one will fall on the spectrum of mainstream popularity. With a global marketing budget costing tens of millions plus an awards<\/a> campaign that one insider estimated could be as high as $15 million, the movie, which is predicted to open on the soft side at $20 to $25 million domestic, is unlikely to make its money back. It would have to gross north of $300 million worldwide to break even, according to the insider. Cruise movies do tend to gross more overseas, so that could offset any weaker domestic numbers.<\/p>\n

\"'TropicTom Cruise in \u2018Tropic Thunder\u2019Photo: Merie Weismiller<\/p>\n

So it makes sense that Warners is going all in to promote Hollywood\u2019s last movie star. Giant billboards are up on Sunset Boulevard and main thoroughfares in Los Angeles, and we can expect him to show up for junkets and anything safe. He will not sit down with a serious journalist \u2014 Kim Masters? Not happening \u2014 who might ask impertinent questions. Cruise\u2019s press attach\u00e9 is no longer his sister but veteran publicist Jan Craft, who used to work for Warners. The mighty Strategy PR is on the awards campaign. <\/p>\n

As for I\u00f1\u00e1rritu, he\u2019s all in on Cruise. \u201cIt was the most amazing, unexpected, sweet, gentle relation that I have had on a set,\u201d I\u00f1\u00e1rritu told me a few months ago. \u201cHis manners, his understanding, his passion, and his integrity, and the way he prepares. He loves the process. Filmmaking has been his life for 40 years. I have never seen somebody so devoted. I was happy to share with him that passion. And at the same time, we built an incredible relation of mutual trust. He will surprise the world. People will see a new kind of thing. It was blessed, and not only him, but all the cast: Riz Ahmed, Sandra H\u00fcller, John Goodman, and Jesse Plemons. We had a blast. It was challenging, but it was wild comedy. And we laugh a lot. We have a wild time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fasten your seatbelts!<\/p>\n

\u201cDigger\u201d opens in theaters on Friday, October 2.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Tom Cruise buckled in for Alejandro G. I\u00f1\u00e1rritu\u2019s Legendary\/Warner Bros. adventure \u201cDigger,\u201d shot in 35mm VistaVision by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":627047,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6971,321,176208,93,1043,61,60,2625,5592],"class_list":["post-627046","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-awards","tag-celebrities","tag-digger","tag-entertainment","tag-film","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-oscars","tag-tom-cruise"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627046","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=627046"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627046\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/627047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=627046"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=627046"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=627046"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}