I Do Think Tom Cruise Needs A Haircut

Mission: Possible :)

More from Hung Up this week: There will be a Hung Up chat tomorrow for the Knicks game!¹ … I went live with

Brandon Kyle Goodman

for their “Messy Mondays” and we had a time … The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives returns this week,² and I profiled Whitney Leavitt for Vulture

Tom Cruise attends the BFI Chair's dinner, where he was awarded a BFI Fellowship on May 12 in London, England. (Photo: Dave Benett/Getty Images for British Film Institute)

Like most American moviegoers, I suffer from a condition where I am basically always thinking about Tom Cruise. I am thinking about Tom Cruise running and Tom Cruise dancing. I am thinking about Tom Cruise’s chilling conviction in Magnolia. I am thinking about Tom Cruise in American Made. I am thinking about Tom Cruise calling Nicole Kidman “Nic,” and also the fact that he was married to her. I am thinking about Tom Cruise in A Few Good Men. I am thinking about Tom Cruise in The Color of Money.³ I am thinking about Tom Cruise jumping on Oprah’s couch, obviously, but I am also thinking about one specific paparazzi shot of him and Katie Holmes where they have the same exact hair. I am thinking about Tom Cruise’s indignant horniness in Eyes Wide Shut. (I have not one print from Eyes Wide Shut in my home but two. An agenda item for my therapist for another day.) There is no man preternaturally American or preternaturally movie star than Tom Cruise, though George Clooney and Julia Roberts are obviously very close.

Tom Cruise is not beholden to the rules of gravity, time, space, and/or physics that limit my existence and probably limit yours too. Tom Cruise speeds through the streets and glides through the air, and dangles off skyscrapers. Aside from the fact that he’s plagued by a unique set of occupational hazards (the same scrapes every time), he survives all this, and then a director calls “Cut!,” and then Tom Cruise does it all again. It was fashionable, for a time, for white women to print “You have as many hours a day as Beyoncé” on mugs and sell them on Etsy. I don’t believe that’s true of Tom Cruise. I think he squeezes more hours out of more days by not needing as much sleep as the rest of us. And also: I think he probably sleeps upside down like a bat. I have as much evidence supporting that theory (none) as I have disputing it (again, none), so I consider it very likely.

So it’s with a lot of respect (the man single-handedly saved the theatrical experience post-COVID!) that I’ll hold his hands when I say this: Tom Cruise needs a haircut.

Tom Cruise embraces (?) Esai Morales at the BFI Chair's dinner in London, England. (Photo: Dave Benett/Getty Images for British Film Institute)

I like Tom Cruise with long hair. I like Tom Cruise with short hair. But I don’t love Tom Cruise with this hair.