Katie Holmes Interview: Matt Lauer Brings Up Tom Cruise’s Fiery Response From The Past, How Does She React?
Katie Holmes sat down Tuesday morning with Matt Lauer on Today to discuss a new indie flick she’s starring in called Touched with Fire. In a small segment of her interview with Lauer, the subject of Tom Cruise came up.
How did Holmes react to her ex’s name being brought up?
Us Magazine reports that Matt Lauer turned to that infamous interview he had with Holme’s ex-husband a decade ago in which they got into a heated discussion over psychiatry and drugs used to treat it. It was relevant in some fashion to their conversation since Touched with Fire is about a poet who battles bipolar disorder and the story has to do with exploring the use of drugs to treat mental illness. This gave Lauer the perfect opportunity to talk about Tom Cruise.
You have to watch how Katie Holmes reacted when Matt Lauer brought up THAT Tom Cruise chat: https://t.co/DWDepGFgO3 pic.twitter.com/NZtXwe17xh
— Us Weekly (@usweekly) February 9, 2016
Matt Lauer interviewed Tom Cruise in June 2005 while he was promoting War of Worlds. Cruise and Lauer debated the merits of psychiatry, and Cruise criticized Brooke Shields for taking antidepressants to help her with postpartum depression. Lauer sarcastically told Cruise that he’d done his “homework” and really understands mental illness. Cruise was clearly against the use of drugs in treating mental illness, calling psychiatry a “pseudo-science,” and believes drugs “mask” the problem — making his exchange with Lauer tense. There’s no such thing as a “chemical imbalance,” he said. Lauer challenged him further on his seemingly inaccurate remarks, and it resulted in Cruise calling Lauer “glib.”
So, when Lauer was speaking with Katie Holmes on Tuesday, he recalled that uncomfortable moment.
“It also asks the question: Is it beneficial to treat these people with drugs?” Lauer said to Holmes. “You and I both remember a heated discussion I got into on that subject here in this studio. How do you think the movie comes down on that? Where does it lead the viewer?”
Holmes smiled but didn’t engage in Lauer’s comment. Instead, she acknowledged the disagreement that took place between him and Cruise. She focused on the director of her new film and how well he addressed the issue of mental illness and drugs.
“Right,” she replied. “Well, what I think that our director did a wonderful job with is — this movie kind of just shows this is it. These two characters are in a love story, which he says is kind of its own mania. He puts the question out there for the audience to make the question.”
Katie Holmes handled herself like a pro and wasn’t the least bit shaken up by Matt Lauer having to include Tom Cruise’s name in their conversation. To some degree, she probably expected to be hit with something. It’s not unheard of in live interviews anymore.
Matt Lauer recalls THAT Tom Cruise interview during his sit-down with Katie Holmes: https://t.co/kWVc2q058w pic.twitter.com/xmiEllm1jy
— E! Online (@eonline) February 9, 2016
As Page Six reports, when Matt Lauer appeared on Bravo’s Watch What Happens Live, he said he wanted to take Tom Cruise in a wrestling match or tackle him on the set.
He added that it was an interview he learned a lot from. It’s not one of his favorite interviews of all-time. Lauer said as a journalist, when you have an experience like that, you re-evaluate what you can do to make it better and take it as a learning experience.
Did Lauer use the interview he had with Cruise as a tool to get a reaction out of Holmes? If he did, it there was very little drama he stirred up from the actress.
[Photo by Charles Sykes/Invision/AP]
