Key Points
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Tom Cruise doesn’t read scripts for prospective projects.
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Instead, he asks the writer or director to read the script to him.
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Cruise likes hearing the story from the director’s POV in order to get a clear understanding of what the film will be.
Tom Cruise doesn’t read scripts.
Instead, when he’s being considered for a project, he asks the writer or director to read the story to him. And while it may seem strange, Cruise shared that there is a practical reason for his method.
“What I do with with directors and writers is I don’t read the scripts,” Cruise explained on the Sept. 18 episode of New Heights. “I have them read it to me. I have them read it to me because I don’t want my ideas to invade it yet. I want to understand what is their communication. They’ve been working on it and they have things that are just there.”
He also thinks it’s the best way to get in the mind of a moviegoer because he can spot the strengths and weaknesses of a script when listening to someone read the story.
“I’m the audience. I am a movie, I’m a popcorn guy. Like, I’m a meat and potatoes, popcorn, [guy]” the 64-year-old said. “Is it moving me or am I invested? Am I not invested? Where am I engaged? Where am I not engaged? That’s just who I am.”
The Diggerstar likes to know a director’s vision for a film so that he could make creative decisions effectively. Cruise said he asks the directors about their plans for lighting, cinematography, wardrobe, and more. Once he knows “tonally what they’re going for,” he goes in on his performance, opting to show the director his ideas for a character rather than tell.
“We get to a place where I start to understand and then I’m like I know how to contribute to that motion,” he said. “Now, it sparks ideas and I kind of have certain ideas that I have and certain things that I’d like to play with. And then, I don’t necessarily talk about it. I just do it.”
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And with his upcoming film Digger, directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu, Cruise kept up with this tradition of having the director read to him.
“We’re exploring rhythms, and I’m feeling the world,” he told Empire Magazine in an interview published on Aug. 20. “I’m literally an audience. I want to hear his voice. I want to understand, and see the world the way he sees it.”
Watch the full episode of New Heights with Tom Cruise below. Digger is in theaters on Oct. 2.
Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly
