There are so many deserving choices for This Day in History stories today. It’s hard to just choose one. There’s the 1997 release of the USAF report on the Roswell UFO sightings. This came only 50 years after the original incident. Hey, talk about a swift retort! Or, there’s the 1993 Yale mail-bombing of a computer science professor. That craziness turned out to be the work of Ted Kaczyniski, later known as the UNABOMBER.
But instead…
The one I’m choosing is the 2005 Tom Cruise interview on the Today show: NOT because I think Tom Cruise is a jerk, though he is. And NOT because I think Scientology is a crock, though it is. And not EVEN because I care a whit about Brooke Shields, who Cruise criticized on-air for her use of anti-depressants to treat post-partum depression. This prompted fierce push back from host Matt Lauer against his tiny misguided guest. Here is how History.com sets the scene:
When Lauer asked Cruise about his criticism of Shields, the exchange got heated. Cruise’s demeanor became visibly more serious and combative. As a leading member of the Church of Scientology, Cruise is against the use of anti-depressant drugs or psychiatric therapy of any kind. “I really care about Brooke Shields. But there’s misinformation. She doesn’t understand the history of psychiatry. Psychiatry is a pseudoscience.”
After chastising Lauer for being “glib” and not knowing enough about the topic, Cruise mentioned his research into the use of the prescription drug Ritalin. This drug is notably used to treat hyperactive children. When Lauer mentioned that he knew people for whom prescription drugs had worked, Cruise accused him of “advocating” Ritalin. To which Lauer got visibly frustrated and said “You’re telling me that your experiences with the people I know, which are zero, are more important than my experience. And I’m telling you, I’ve lived with these people, and they’re better.”
Preach it, brother Matt!
I dunno, call me crazy, but there’s something I find supremely endearing about steely-cool Cruise flipping his wig on camera. And there’s no shortage of celebrities subscribing to, and publicly promoting, all sorts of craziness, since – well, since forever. Hell, there are even still a few lunatic anti-vaxxers roaming loose out there: Are you listening, Jessica Biel?
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No, the real reason I chose this story has nothing to do with unnecessary prescriptions for psychotropic medications, or the self-immolation of self-involved celebrities run amok. Instead, it’s an introduction to today’s Word of the Day … <wait for it> … “Chernobyled!” Truth to tell, this isn’t really a word at all. But some episodes of craziness are just too perfect to pass up. Well, this is one of them. As History.com explains:
Lauer’s interview marked the latest in what the Washington Post called at the time “a series of manic moments in public, in which the screen idol appeared to be losing his chiseled, steely reserve.” Another of these moments had occurred earlier that month on Oprah Winfrey’s talk show. That’s where Cruise jumped up and down on a couch professing his love for Holmes. During the Today interview, Holmes sat in the wings watching “adoringly” as her fiance “Chernobyled” (again in the words of the Washington Post).
Some blamed Cruise’s run of out-of-control public outbursts on the actor’s split with longtime publicist, Pat Kingsley, in the spring of 2004 and his decision to entrust his sister, Lee Ann DeVette, with all his publicity. In November 2005, after the worst run of publicity in his career, Cruise replaced DeVette with another veteran publicist, Paul Bloch.
To me, firing your publicist after blowing your stack on national TV sounds a bit like closing the barn door after your horse is already a good long ways down the road… but I digress.
