How Tom Cruise Could Claw Back $150 Million from Digger

Article by Peter Brooker

Oh no. Tom’s a flop.

There’s something that genuinely gets me down when I hear the words, “Tom Cruise has bombed at the box office.” And flop is such a horrible word, isn’t it? Can anyone put the word flop into a positive sentence?

“I flopped my wang out on the table.”

No. See? There is no positive way to use the word flop. You can have a positive bomb. She’s the bomb! But there is no positive flop.

Anyway, I’ve been thinking. What if there was a way for Tom Cruise to claw back some of the money from Digger? And I’m semi-serious when I say this, but hear me out.

Let’s assume the film has somehow left the studio about $150 million in the hole. That’s a lot of money, even if you are Tom Cruise. So I Googled how much people pay for celebrity autographs, and we’re talking a couple of hundred dollars, give or take.

Now, Tom was in that fat suit for a couple of hours a day, wasn’t he? So here’s my idea.

First, the physical poster run.

Tom does a limited edition run of Digger posters. Not just any posters, mind you. These are physically signed by Tom Cruise, and then every other member of the cast signs them as well. A proper collector’s item. You could probably charge a grand for the complete set of signatures if you marketed it properly.

And I Googled it: apparently, you can sign a thousand autographs in about three hours. So that’s one afternoon sitting in make-up, signing a thousand posters while they’re fitting the prosthetics and making him look like a completely different human being.

Sell a thousand posters at a thousand quid apiece and that’s £1 million back. There you go. You’re only about £149 million in the hole now.
Second, personalised Tom Cruise videos.

You know that Cameo business, where celebrities record personalised birthday messages? Well, Tom could do that while he’s still in the fat suit. He’s already sitting there for hours, so he might as well earn a few quid.

Imagine a thousand personalised videos in a day. At a hundred quid each, that’s another £100,000. And if he sang a few lines of “You Never Close Your Eyes Anymore When I Kiss Your Lips” — you know, the Righteous Brothers song from Top Gun — people would pay extra for that.

Actually, get Goose involved for the duet. Now we’re talking! That’s another thousand quid for the deluxe package. People would pay for that sort of nostalgia.

All right, perhaps a thousand videos in a day is pushing it. But you get the idea: Tom Cruise could turn his downtime into a revenue stream.

And if he did manage to bring in another million quid through personalised appearances and premium fan experiences, that’s £2 million recovered already.

He’s now only £148 million in the hole.

Not bad, is it?

Third, the Tom Cruise experience.

This is where it gets interesting. There are very rich people out there who like Tom Cruise. Some of them would pay an extraordinary amount of money for a private appearance.

How about Tom comes round to your house and jumps on your sofa for £100,000? You could have the full experience. He arrives, talks about Scientology — well, perhaps not that bit — jumps on your sofa, tells you how much he loves you, and then leaves.

You’d have a story for the rest of your life.

And if you could sell ten of those experiences, there’s another million quid. Maybe you could auction off a private dinner, a film set visit, or a chance to watch Tom do one of his ridiculous stunts. There must be people out there who’d pay for that.

I’m not saying this would save the film. But you could certainly start chipping away at the losses.

And then we come to the real question: what the hell happened?

Because this is what I find so extraordinary about Digger. You’ve arguably got the biggest movie star in the world, a man who has spent decades making enormous hits, and suddenly people are talking about the biggest box-office flop of all time.

How does that happen?
Well, perhaps the problem is that nobody knew what the fuck the film was about going in.

We like Tom Cruise. We like him handsome. We like him running on top of trains that are about to go over a cliff. We like him hanging off aeroplanes, jumping out of helicopters and doing things that would make a sensible insurance company shut its doors.

But this time? He’s in a fat suit, playing a character that audiences might not immediately recognise as the Tom Cruise they know and love.

And I’m not saying that’s necessarily a bad thing. Actors should be allowed to take risks. But if you’re spending an enormous amount of money on a film, surely you hedge your bets?

I’d have been in that production office saying, “Right, lads. This thing could be a masterpiece, or it could tank. So while Tom’s sitting in make-up for four hours a day, let’s see what else we can monetise.”

Get the posters signed. Record the personalised videos. Arrange the premium appearances. Sell some exclusive behind-the-scenes experiences. Make a few quid while the prosthetics are going on.

And if the film turns into a massive hit? Brilliant! Everyone celebrates, and nobody needs to worry about the posters.

Although, I did have one other idea.

Could we get some of Tom’s sperm and sell it on the black market? There must be a few million quid in that, surely.

Obviously, if the film makes its money back, he gets his sperm back. I’m not a monster.

And that brings me to another question. Is it true that sperm banks have height restrictions? I’m sure I read somewhere that they prefer donors over five-foot-eight. Perhaps we only want tall people on this planet now.

Do we really want to live in a land of giants?

Have you ever been to the cinema and had a six-foot-five bloke sit directly in front of you? You might as well pack up and go home. You can see the back of his head and about a third of the screen.

It’s the same at concerts. Tall f*ckers everywhere. They get served at the bar first because they can actually see the barman. Women love them, don’t they? Tall, dark and handsome. They’d settle for just tall, some of them.

If you’re under five-foot-eight, you’ve got to be able to play the piano like Dudley Moore to stand a chance. Short blokes have to work twice as hard. No wonder we’re angry all the time. We can’t see over the bloke in front, and apparently we’ve got to work twice as hard to get laid.

It all makes sense now.

Anyway, where was I?
Oh, yes. Tom Cruise and Digger.

My point is this: when you’ve spent that kind of money on a film, you need a plan B. You can’t simply rely on the box office, no matter how famous your leading man is.

Tom Cruise has a fan base, a recognisable brand and decades of films that people love. There must be ways to turn that into additional revenue if the main event doesn’t deliver.

Will a few signed posters and personalised videos recover $150 million? Of course not. But they might recover a few million, create some publicity, and give the fans something genuinely collectible.

And if all else fails, there’s always the sofa-jumping experience. Just make sure the studio gets its cut.

Photo by Augusto Oazi on Unsplash