Quick Links
Shortly afterTom Cruisegraduated from high school in 1980, he left Glen Ridge, New Jersey, where he spent his teenage years, and moved to New York to pursue an acting career. A few months later, Cruise, whose only previous acting experience had been a featured role in a high-school production ofthe musicalGuys and Dolls, landed his first screen acting role, a bit part in the 1981 romantic drama filmEndless Love.
While the then-unknown Cruise was initially considered for the lead male role inEndless Love, which is based on Scott Spencer’s acclaimed 1979 novel of the same name,he was beaten out by the equally unknown Martin Hewitt for the role of David, a troubled young man whose obsessive love for a girl, played by Brooke Shields, has destructive consequences for the rest of David’s life. Amid a series of fortuitous circumstances that altered his career in the early 1980s,losing the lead role inEndless Loveturned out to be a lucky break for Cruise. While the film’s critical failure ultimately doomed Hewitt’s career prospects, Cruise’s brief appearance inEndless Lovewent virtually unrecognized until he gained stardom with the hit1983 teen comedy filmRisky Business.
Indeed, the most interesting aspect of Cruise’s screen acting debut is how his brief and uninspiring appearance inEndless Loveheralded one of the most rapid ascensions to stardom in history, in which the now 62-year-old actor has indisputably become Hollywood’s most enduring and iconic star over the past 40 years.
Tom Cruise Has a Small but Pivotal Role in Endless Love
Scott Spencer’s great 1979 novelEndless Loveis a powerfulstory of obsessive love, as recounted by David, who recalls, with longing and rage, the great love of his life, Jade, over a decade after their powerful teenage romance was destroyed by adult pressure and tragic circumstance. In contrast, the 1981 film adaptation, which was directed by Franco Zeffirelli, presents the story in chronological order, as aconventional teenage romantic dramain which David and Jade’s relationship is destroyed primarily by Jade’s father.
In the film, David, who was initially welcomed into Jade’s Bohemian household, incurs the wrath of Jade’s father, who forbids David, played by Martin Hewitt, from seeing Jade, played by Brooke Shields, for at least one month. This banishment is unacceptable to David, who desperately tries to reconnect with Jade, who begins avoiding him at their high school.
Tom Cruise’s First 10 Movies, Ranked
From Taps to Risky Business, here are the first 10 movies of the beloved, talented Tom Cruise, ranked.
Enter Tom Cruise as Billy, a teenager who, after hearing David’s plight, tells him how Billy was mistakenly viewed as a hero as a child after setting fire to a stack of newspapers and then putting the fire out. This seemingly idle suggestion has a profound effect on David, who subsequently decides to set fire to Jade’s house by setting fire to a stack of newspapers, as Billy described, in the hopes of being viewed as a hero by Jade’s father. Instead, David is convicted of arson and placed in a mental hospital.
Cruise’s lone scene, which appears nearly halfway into the film and spans approximately 45 seconds, serves as a catalyst for everything that transpires in the rest of the film. In the context ofCruise’s overall career, his shaggy and ungainly appearance inEndless Lovehighlights his relative inexperience, especially compared to his featured supporting appearance in the 1981 drama thriller filmTaps, in which Cruise’s intense performance as hotheaded military cadet David Shawn is one of the film’s highlights.
Endless Love Is a Failed Adaptation of a Great Novel
Like mostfailed literary adaptations,Endless Loveis needlessly faithful to unimportant aspects of its source material, the 1979 novel of the same name, while misinterpreting its particular strengths. This is especially evident in the scene in which Tom Cruise’s character, Billy, provides the inspiration for David’s decision to set fire to his girlfriend Jade’s house, while the novel effectively presents the fire as being a manifestation of David’s grief and passion.Moreover, while the fire serves as a powerful opening scene in the novel, the fire scene arrives more than halfway into the film, which is a logical and structural mess.
Why Tom Cruise is the World’s Most Enduring Film Star
Tom Cruise’s unparalleled success owes as much to intelligence and timing as it does charisma and talent.
WhileEndless Love, which grossed more than $30 million at the domestic box office, performed respectably, the film’s fundamental mishandling of its source material led many critics to appropriately label the adaptation as a travesty. The film’s poor reputation is embodied in the fact thatEndless Loveis, in addition to marking Cruise’s first screen acting appearance, best known for its eponymous theme song, performed by Diana Ross and Lionel Ritchie, which became a number-one hit and received a Best Original Song Academy Award nomination.
Fate Guided Cruise’s Rise to Stardom
Tom Cruise’s status as theultimate movie star of his generationowes partly to the fact that he, unlike most of his movie-star contemporaries, has only ever acted in feature films, though his avoidance of acting on television wasn’t intentional on his part. In 1982, Cruise performed a screen test for the titular starring role in the NBC science fiction television seriesThe Powers of Matthew Star. However, he lost the role to Peter Barton.
If Cruise had won the starring role inThe Powers of Matthew Star, which only lasted one season and is regarded as one of the worst television shows of its era, it’s entirely possible that his feature-film ambitions would have been delayed, if not thwarted altogether. In retrospect, this rejection turned out to be a blessing for Cruise, who, in addition tohis obvious dedication and talent, has demonstrated an uncanny ability throughout his career to be in the right place at the right time.Endless Loveis streaming for free onTubi.
