10 Crazy Actor Truths We Just Learned
4. Tom Cruise Saved An Oscar-Nominated Movie From Being Cut By Harvey Weinstein
Tom Cruise has accomplished many great things throughout his career, yet one of the very best just might be something that went unspoken for over 20 years.
While promoting his new movie Tár a few months ago, director Todd Field revealed to The New Yorker that Cruise effectively rescued his 2001 movie In the Bedroom from being cut to ribbons by disgraced Miramax boss Harvey Weinstein.
The film debuted to rave reviews out of the Sundance Film Festival that year and was soon enough acquired by Miramax, which given Weinstein's rep for mercilessly chopping films up for mainstream release, immediately distressed Field.
But Field called up Cruise, with whom he previously starred in Eyes Wide Shut, who had a game plan to help him triumph over a producer infamously dubbed "Harvey Scissorhands" in the industry:
"I was weeping in the bathroom... I called up Tom Cruise and said, 'Something terrible has happened.' He basically said, 'This is how you're going to play it. It's going to take you six months, and you'll beat him, but you have to do exactly what I'm going to tell you to do, step by step.'"
Cruise instructed Field to allow Weinstein to re-edit In the Bedroom without protest, and after it test-screened to a poor response, he could then point to the Sundance acclaim and recommend releasing it in its original, unbutchered form.
That's precisely what Field did, and it worked like a charm - his original Sundance cut of the movie was released to strong box office and awards success, receiving five Oscar nominations including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay for Field.