Cruise, Kidman Split and the Gossip Begins | Hamptons Boom or Bust: $50 Million Home on Market | Giuliani's Book Agent Is No Book Agent | Soap Story: Will Mobsters Rub Out Guiding Light?
Cruise, Kidman Split and the Gossip Begins
The tongues are going to start wagging: Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman are splitsville after 10 years. A press release issued from their publicity agency stated:
"Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman announced today that they have regretfully decided to separate. The couple, who married in 1990, stressed their great respect for each other, both personally and professionally. Citing the difficulties inherent in divergent careers which constantly keep them apart, they concluded that an amicable separation seemed best for both of them at this time."
What's going to get the gossips going is that the couple has rather not been apart all that much. Indeed, they were cheek-by-jowl together for 18 months during the shooting of Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut in London and during the long Mission: Impossible 2 shoot in Australia. If anything, the Cruises have depicted themselves as the perfect celebrity couple.
And when Kidman appeared mostly naked on stage in London and New York with actor Ian Glenn in The Blue Room Cruise was in the front row cheering her on.
They have two adopted children: Isabella and Connor, who are 7 and 5, respectively.
In past interviews, Cruise has brushed off the persistent rumor that he's gay. He's even sued tabloids over the false accusation and stopped a magazine story from appearing in Redbook. Currently Cruise is in Los Angeles getting ready to film Steven Spielberg's Minority Report, while Kidman is in New York shooting The Hours with Meryl Streep.
Hamptons Boom or Bust: $50 Million Home on Market
If you'd like to be a neighbor of Steven Spielberg or Ronald Perelman, this might your chance.
A listing goes up this week in East Hampton, N.Y. for a $50 million, 25-acre estate. The home — which is described as "newish" — has 2,000 feet of waterfront access as well.
The owner is said to be European, possibly a German who built a massive home hoping to sell it on spec. The whole deal will be featured in the March issue of Architectural Digest, on sale this week.
The real-estate brokers, if you're interested, are Dunemere, Sotheby's and Alan Schneider. But beware, says one local broker: the house is on the west side of the famed Georgica Pond, actually in the town of Wainscott, and "doesn't have the views one would prefer." Ouch. But what did you expect at that bargain price?
Giuliani's Book Agent Is No Book Agent
Just one year ago Brillstein-Grey, the company that makes The Sopranos and Just Shoot Me for TV, described themselves thusly in a press release: "Brillstein-Grey and its parent company, Basic Entertainment, have produced such TV properties as The Sopranos, Just Shoot Me, and Politically Incorrect and handle a multitude of talent including Nicolas Cage, Bob Costas, Courtney Cox, Lorne Michaels, Brad Pitt, Adam Sandler, and Sylvester Stallone. It is also working on upcoming theatrical releases City by the Sea and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory."
No mention of handling any writers or books of any kind.
So what's Brad Grey doing handling the sale of New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani's two books to Talk/Miramax? And how did Grey, who gave about $25,000 in the last couple of years to the Democratic National Committee and Democratic candidates, suddenly become enamored of Rudy's life story?
Of course, if the $3 million advance is correct, B-G gets upwards of a $300,000 commission. But even that $3 million seems strange. At that rate, Talk would have to sell 120,000 copies of books priced at $25. Even former mayor Ed Koch didn't do that well, and he was considered sort of a humorous guy.
You know Rudy is not going to discuss his love life — he has underage children and an ongoing divorce that he's not going to tamper with. Do people in Michigan really care about the Fulton Fish Market?
Usually a writer meets with an agent who is enthusiastic about his book and his ideology. It's hard to imagine the conversation between Grey and Giuliani this time: "Yeah, we really don't like you, but now we're happy to promote your ideas." Hmmm ... And also, just asking, but wasn't it Mayor Giuliani who disinvited the cast of The Sopranos to a recent city event?
"We've reduced the influence of the Mafia so much," Giuliani said last spring according to The New York Times, "now when they do mob shows, they don't even set them in New York any more. They put them in New Jersey."
Calls to Brillstein-Grey on Friday regarding their new endeavor as literary agents were not returned.
Soap Story: Will Mobsters Rub Out Guiding Light?
Is Guiding Light headed in the same direction as the canceled Another World? If I had to take a bet right now, I'd say yes.
Procter & Gamble, both shows' owner, always vowed never to cancel Another World. Then they systematically got rid of the show's veteran actors, undermined its basic story, and then justified killing the show off.
Guiding Light, which is on CBS, is now populated by new characters so unpopular with the regular fans that its ratings have dropped precipitously. Of course, all soaps are down, a dilemma often blamed on reality TV, Jerry Springer, and O.J. Simpson.
But the reality of the soaps is that for years the same producers and writers have rotated around to the various shows, firing actors from previous regimes and employing the same stories everywhere (secret parentage most popular, followed by faked amnesia, paralysis, and blindness).
What will happen is probably less of a mystery than the plot of the show. By mid-summer the real rumors will start to circulate, especially if there's a Writers Guild strike. Around October 1st, an edict will come down, and by the New Year, TV's longest-running drama could be history.
The solution, if anyone at P&G still cares: bring back adult stars like Maeve Kinkead and Ron Raines, drop the Godfather stuff and the continuing bits on the very fake island of San Cristobel, and get back to basics. "Pamper" the actors. It could be the "Dawn" of a new era. Certainly the "Tide" would turn and maybe viewership wouldn't be so quick to "Crest."
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