Tom Cruise Is Doing Everything He Can To Avoid Will Smith?
Tom Cruise has given Will Smith the cold shoulder ever since the infamous 2022 Oscars slap.
Once upon a time in Hollywood (no, we’re not talking about the Quentin Tarantino film), Tom Cruise and Will Smith were best, if unlikely, buddies. Now, though, the two have grown far apart, both literally and figuratively, partially because of Will Smith’s bad behavior at the Oscars. According to Fandomwire, a source close to Tom Cruise reports that “Will has approached Tom several times, trying to reconnect and see if they can hang out and brainstorm on some projects together… but Tom isn’t biting and doesn’t even write him back.” Ouch.
Tom Cruise surely has sympathy for his old friend Will Smith, but the Top Gun actor has a reputation to uphold. He has worked hard to establish a decent name in Hollywood, and he is notoriously selective when it comes to making friends with other actors in the business. His main goal is to keep up his private, reclusive, stress-free lifestyle in London, where he pretty much avoids all the fuss of the filmmaking industry.
Tom Cruise is worried that any association with Will Smith could lead to bad press for himself, as well as, presumably, an increased paparazzi presence as everyone tries to get inside his head and figure out how he could take Smith’s side in this never-ending drama.
We don’t know what Tom Cruise really thinks about Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Academy Awards last year, but we do know that Will Smith’s career has suffered from it. He eventually broke down and apologized, but that hasn’t done much to help. Chris Rock recently brought the whole issue back to light again when he bitterly brought it up during his stand-up routine, so it doesn’t seem to be going away any time soon.
Still, though, the Fresh Prince actor firmly believes that a Tom Cruise-Will Smith team-up in a good, meaty, successful film could get him back to the top. And he may be right. Two stars of such high caliber collaborating on a project could just be enough to get him back in the public’s good graces.
The issue is this plan is a non-starter. Tom Cruise has reportedly been ignoring Will Smith’s messages and not responding to his attempts to contact him. Will Smith has even offered to come to London and talk to him about it in person if that would be easier for him, but Tom Cruise just isn’t interested. It is unclear whether it is painful for him to give his old friend the cold shoulder or if he just doesn’t want to associate with him at all anymore, but so far, he has stayed firm in his decision to maintain the distance between them.
Tom Cruise recently made his fans happy with the Top Gun sequel, Maverick, and Will Smith has been getting some buzz for his latest movie, Emancipation, but only time will tell if we will ever see the two of them on screen together. For now, it sounds like Will Smith needs to start improving his reputation on his own before Tom Cruise will be open to working with him.
