Hollywood Insiders Laugh With Tom Cruise, Not At Him
A studio lot full of Hollywood "agents, managers, publicists and reporters" found Scientology messiah Tom Cruise hilarious Tuesday night, the Times reported, not because the actor is certifiably insane but because he did a mean impression of Sumner Redstone, the Viacom and Paramount boss who cut ties with Cruise two years ago. The crowd was watching a screening of Paramount comedy Tropic Thunder, which includes a performance by Cruise as a redheaded, pudgy studio executive with lots of chest hair and a penchant for cussing and dirty dancing - a ringer for Redstone. Cruise's performance killed among insiders primed for Hollywood in-jokes and long accustomed to Cruise's unbalanced personality, but it's unlikely the rest of the moviegoing public will be as tickled, and weird that the chummy screening got any notice at all in the Times, even if the paper was trying to make up for missing the story of Cruise's make-up lunch with Redstone last week. After the jump, a side-by-side comparison of Cruise, made up for his character, and Redstone.
