As Americans we all spend our lives doing the same thing. We are born, and spend the first five years of our lives crying, making messes, and playing. Then we turn five and are shoved into school for at least the next thirteen years of our lives, in most cases seventeen years. Then most people get a job, where they work eight hours a day, forty hours a week. We live for the weekends, where we hang out with friends, drink and watch our choice of television. We like our lives. But sometimes, we need an escape. Now, we don’t actually want to escape our lives we just want to temporarily feel like we are escaping: a fantasy of escape. Where do we go to get this? Well…. look around, what do you see? Magazines like People and Us Weekly, Movie Theatres everywhere, and talk shows that interview celebrities like Oprah, Jay Leno, David Letterman, Conan O’Brien, and Ellen DeGeneres. Americans are obsessed. We go to these movies and for two hours we forget about our repetitive, sometimes boring, but decent lives, and fall into someone else’s life. We love the people that are best at convincing us they are the characters we see in these movies. This is where we form a select group of elite male actors: Denzel Washington, Jerry Seinfeld, Steve Carell, Brad Pitt, Josh Hartnett, John Cusack, George Clooney, Tyler Perry, Morgan Freeman, and our favorite, Tom Cruise.
Why do we love these people? Because they show us ‘life outside the box’. We, as Americans cannot escape the feeling of being trapped inside a ‘box’: our own form of Roman Stoicism. When someone asks us “how you doin’ Bob?” We answer, “just fine Sally,” “can’t complain Jane” or the typical, fool-proof answer: “good”. We create a facade of feeling good at all times, we create a repetitive daily routine where we “can’t complain”. We create our daily routine and hate it at the same time. We just need something or someone crazy to show us what life outside our routine or ‘box’ is like. We can’t explain it, but something is missing and when we see something crazy we raise our eyebrows in disapproval while our hearts leap with joy and gratitude. Someone broke out of the box and it doesn’t matter that it wasn’t us, so long as someone escaped the box. We need someone to break free so we know we aren’t trapped. It’s like if we see someone escape the box then we know that escape is an option. And escaping must be an option.
Tom Cruise steps outside the box every time he is on camera. Scratch that, he doesn’t just step outside the box, he leaps! He leaps so far outside the box with his love life with a younger/pregnant Katie Holmes and his comments on psychiatry that he has people like Dr. Harold Koplewicz, M.D. and the American Psychiatric Association making statements refuting his comments because they are so worried that the public will believe his comments. And while we raise our eyebrows in disapproval, and create web sites like “TomCruisesnuts.com” our hearts leap with joy and gratitude. Finally, someone who dares to leave the box! Tom Cruise shows Americans what life outside the box is like. And although we are not eager to join him, we at least know that life outside the box is a possibility. So Tom, we salute you: to living a life outside the box. Without freaks like you we would feel trapped with no foreseeable escape.
~MLA
Works Cited
Church of Scientology International. Church Of Scientology. 21 November 2005. 6 Nov 2007. <http://www.scientology.org>.
Harvey, Jackie. “Is There New Love for Tom Cruise?” The Onion. 11 May 2005. The Outside Scoop: Issue 41-19. 14 November 2007. .
Internet Movie Database. Internet Movie Database Inc. 2 Oct 2007 <http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000129/bio>
Koplewicz, Harold. Tom Cruise: Entertaining or Dangerous? Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology. 2005, 15(3)
Locke, Cindy. “American Psychiatric Association Criticizes Tom Cruise.” People News. 28 June 2005. People Magazine. 14 November 2007. http://people.monstersandcritics.com/news/article_9030.php/American_Psychiatric_Association_criticizes_Tom_Cruise.
Tom Cruise Biography. Tiscali. 5 Oct 2007 <http://www.tiscali.co.uk/entertainment/film/biographies/tom_cruise_biog.html>
Tom Cruise and Oprah – Original Interview. Video Clip. Oprah 31 Aug. 2007. 7 Nov. 2007. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypfOM-hMFGM
“Trapped in the Closet.” South Park. By unknown. Perf. Trey Parker, Matt Stone, Isaac Hayes, Mona Marshall. Comedy Central. WUCW. 16 November 2005.
