Glib Paramount Exec Axes Cruise

Paramount Pictures recently severed ties with Tom Cruise’s film production company, Cruise/Wagner Productions. Tom’s partner Paula Wagner stated that the split was due to failed financial negotiations and not because Tom is as mad as a hatter.

Cruise/Wagner Productions has been responsible for the following movies, which also starred Tom Cruise:

• Mission: Impossible I, II and III
• The Last Samurai
• Minority Report
• Vanilla Sky
• War of the Worlds

In recent years, the deal with Paramount paid Cruise up to $10 million a year to develop films and operate an office on the Paramount lot. This is how the deal worked for Tom Cruise:

Paycheck #1: Tom gets 10 million dollars a year to develop films.
Paycheck #2: Tom earns 20 million dollars to star in the film he was paid to develop.
Paycheck #3: Tom earns producer money on top of the 30 million he already earned.

Virtually any male actor under the age of 45 could have starred in War of the Worlds. Special effects and computer graphics made that movie worth watching, not Mr. Cruise’s skills as an actor. (Don’t get me started on Dakota Fanning and her constant screaming.)

So, poor Tom will have to live on 10 million dollars less this year. But since The Church of Scientology gets 10-15% of his earnings, he will really only be out somewhere in the neighborhood of 8.5 to 9 million dollars.

I don’t think baby Suri will have to wear outfits from Target.