Paramount ends contract with Tom Cruise

[Phoenix Dark]

NEW YORK, Aug 22 (Reuters) - Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures unit is ending its 14-year relationship with Tom Cruise's film production company because of the actor's offscreen behavior, the company's chairman said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.

Sumner Redstone, Viacom chairman, said the behavior of the star of the "Mission: Impossible" series and "Top Gun" was unacceptable to the company, according to the Wall Street Journal story e-mailed to reporters.

Cruise, one of Hollywood's biggest stars, has been known more recently for his antics on U.S. television talk shows, including jumping up and down on Oprah Winfrey's couch to declare his love for Katie Holmes and criticizing the use of antidepressant drugs.

"As much as we like him personally, we thought it was wrong to renew his deal," Redstone was quoted as saying in the Wall Street Journal. "His recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount."

Cruise's representatives and officials from Viacom and Paramount did not have any immediate comment on the report.

http://today.reuters.com/news/articleinvesting.aspx?view=CN&storyID=2006-08-22T230910Z_01_N22285827_RTRIDST_0_MEDIA-CRUISE.XML&rpc=66&type=qcna

Their loss.

Say what you will about Cruise, but he's still a bankable star. When he makes a good movie (IE War of the Worlds) his antics don't effect its preformance. MIII bombed because people weren't interested in the series.

[Van Cruncheon]

Our win. Scientology gets less media exposure.

[The Fake Shemp]

War of the Worlds didn't make money because of Tom Cruise.  It made money because it had aliens blowing shit up and fucking Spielberg.  Spielberg's name puts asses in seats.  If it didn't have Spielberg, it probably would've tanked.

[Phoenix Dark]

War of the Worlds didn't make money because of Tom Cruise.  It made money because it had aliens blowing shit up and fucking Spielberg.  Spielberg's name puts asses in seats.  If it didn't have Spielberg, it probably would've tanked.

Bret Ratner could have made that a hit as long as he had IDLM doing the effects. Movie was just awesome: Tom Cruise, Morgan Freeman's voice, that cute little girl, and fucking aliens. What could go wrong?

[The Fake Shemp]

Tom Cruise.

[Vania]

tom rocked in MI3

[The Fake Shemp]

Yeah, he rocked the mediocre box office performance - hell yeah!

[Phoenix Dark]

The movie made back its budget and I'm sure the DVD sales will be good. Tom is not going anywhere.

Personally, I feel it's a crime that he won't play Iron Man. He IS Tony Starks god dammit. This should have been clear to everyone once they saw his look in Last Samauri.

That would put Tom into the strateshere again.