Friday, June 17, 2005

Thoughts on the Marriage of Pete Mitchell and Joey Potter

Look, even if it is a sham marriage, maybe it'll be a good sham marriage and both Cruise and the future Mrs. Cruise will get what they want out of the relationship. Nothing but best wishes to the happy couple.

Still, I can't help but think that we're responsible for this engagement, and by "we," I mean you, me, and everyone else in America who has been sniggering about the couple for the last few weeks.

Time was, Hollywood produced sham couples, the public realized it was a stunt, and everyone played along. The Cruise-Holmes affair has been mocked by everyone in America--even by CNN anchors--since Day 1. In public, in private, on blogs, on TV programs, in newspapers. No one has pretended for even a moment that this might be the real thing.

And so Tom Cruise, confronted with a hostile public and press, decided he had to take it up a level:
You don't believe we're dating? Fine, well we're in love!

You don't believe we're in love? Fine, we're thinking about getting engaged!

You don't believe we might get engaged? There's the ring, bucko. Let's get nuts!

It reminds me of the Seinfeld episode where George has lied to his future in-laws about his house in the Hamptons and, rather than concede what they all know is a lie, he keeps upping the stakes, driving them out to the beach in the middle of the night, describing the atrium, going all the way to the end of the island, and then, finally, setting off on foot to the dunes, crying, "LET'S GET NUTS!"

This is where Cruise is now, and if we don't all start going along with it, poor Katie will have to get pregnant on their wedding night.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Call me a hopeless romantic, but maybe they are in love. A lot of the press has been about how crazy they're acting. People seem to be put off with the way they talk about how they're so excited to be with each other. Maybe they're saying these things because they're true. After I first met my wife, I'm sure my friends thought I was crazy. We were married six months after we met; our tenth anniversary is next month and I'm still hopelessly in love with her. Why can't the same thing happen to famous people?

I can't even begin to imagine the bubble they've lived their lives in. I can't even fathom what it would be like to have all of my failed romances broadcast world wide. What if Nicole Kidman was a result of media and fan pressure, and this is Tom just looking to do things his own way this time? Let's sit back, believe they're in love, and let them enjoy life for a while.

Anonymous said...

Because Tom Cruise is gay and this is a Scientology-engineered union?

I dunno.

David Drake said...

...great post, and if I may add, I believe Georges' horses were named Snoopy and Prickly Pete.

Anonymous said...

At that point, weren't they George's former future in-laws, as I believe Susan was already dead.

B.B. said...

You don't believe we might get engaged? There's the ring, bucko. Let's get nuts!

Uh, Tommy? You've been there for ages now, son. You're the freking MAYOR of "Nuts!"

Anonymous said...

Katie may or may not be the virgin she claims to be, but certainly marriage to Tommy would suggest she at least intends to pursue a period of celibacy.

Jay D. Homnick said...

Cruise has been accused of being a cruiser and not a kid man for a long time and all my Hollywood friends chuckle knowingly, as if he is the Rock Hudson of our generation.

But the real truth is that no one knows for sure, and the fact that their kids were adopted does not turn Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman into Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley. They had a nine year marriage that seemed quite legitimate.

And if he is a little light in the heels, it does not mean that he cannot consummate a marriage. Plenty of guys do. The Weekly Standard last year ran an excellent review last year about just such a writer. Just shhhh; keep it down with this stuff around Steve Forbes.

Jay D. Homnick said...

Oops, wrote "last year" twice in that sentence.

Anonymous said...

Katie Holmes is letting him in her pants, gay or not. Heck, I might switch for a shot at that, were I gay and were she willing to have my tubby self.