Our Own New Rules

With apologies to Bill Maher, and his brilliantly funny "New Rules" segment on his HBO show, "Real Time with Bill Maher", we have our own set of New Rules.

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New Rule: Tom Cruise must go away.

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Hollywood is abuzz this week because Tom's latest film, "Knight and Day", with co-star Cameron Diaz, is tanking at the box office, or at least turning in disappointing box office figures. Hollywood headlines are circling the town like a plague, "What does it mean when two A-List stars can't carry a movie?" The film community is frightened.

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Hey, calm down, Tinsel Town. A-List stars can still carry a movie, but maybe it's time for you to consider that Tom Cruise is no longer on the A-List. Tom will turn 48 next week, and even though he looks amazingly good for a late middle-aged man, he's still 48, and to the legions of tween and barely post-pubescent movie ticket buyers, that's dinosaur age. He's old enough to be their grandfather. Young audiences want to see Taylor Lautner and Robert Pattinson and Harry Potter and whomever else makes them want to rub their popcorn boxes dangerously close to their nether regions; they don't want to watch an aging sex symbol obnoxiously chewing up the scenery in another tired retread of "Mission Impossible".

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But let's face it, the real reason why Tom needs to go is because he's just too closely branded with crazy. Ever since the Oprah couch jumping stunt and the Matt Lauer interview, it's impossible to watch Tom Cruise without thinking he's nuttier than our Aunt Margaret who thinks her kitties are reincarnated U.S. presidents. For an actor to sell tickets, the audience has to, first, like that actor, and second, be willing to suspend reality and to buy into whatever fantasy that actor is selling for two hours on the screen. And with Tom, it's impossible to buy his onscreen fantasy because his real life fantasy, his real life, is just too out there. His real life is so bizarre, it gets in the way; it's downright unnerving. And if what little we know about him is not enough, you just know that at any moment, the secret closet doors of the Church of Scientology are going to suddenly fly open, and then god knows what shit is going to come out about him. At this point, Tom Cruise is damaged goods; he's just too far gone for us to trust him.

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So goodbye, Tom. Go deep within those hallowed halls of the big, weird building off the 101 in West Hollywood, and exorcise whatever demons who you hear speaking to you in your head, but please, for the time being, leave our multiplexes alone, and stop scaring our children. And us.