Even The Way Tom Cruise Eats Popcorn Is Unique

Tom Cruise might be an actor, but he sure is a character in real life, and that's putting it mildly. But before I veer too far off course, I'll have to steer the ship back towards our favorite subject, food, and namely, how Tom Cruise eats it. A video of the actor recently popped up on the internet showing him eating movie theater popcorn at a film event, and the way he does it definitely has people talking.

Cruise, apparently, likes to eat his popcorn with intensity. He takes a small handful of it, jostles it around in his closed hand like a pair of dice, and then launches it in his mouth at high velocity. At one point, he even spills a bunch on the floor of the movie theater with some seemingly jittery energy. It's hard to tell if he's nervous, intense, or if he just eats it that way as a human being (imagine this guy tearing into a rotisserie chicken with his bare hands). 

Of course, commenters had some things to say. One pointed out, "He's eating it like any other middle-aged dad!" Another person agreed with this, saying that "All dads do this. Also with peanuts." When you put it in that context, that does make sense; I've seen people pick at mixed nuts and eat them that way at parties before. But man, does Cruise's popcorn snacking make me feel twitchy all of a sudden.

It'd be one thing if Tom Cruise didn't know about the world's reaction to the video, but he was actually asked about it directly during his appearance on "The Pat McAfee Show" on May 21, 2025. "I've never seen anybody eat popcorn like this," co-host Darius Butler said to Cruise after displaying the video of him eating popcorn on screen. "Are you actually eating popcorn, or are you full of s**t right here, TC? I've got to know (via YouTube)." Cruise laughs and says, "Man, I'm eating popcorn. They know when I'm going to these movies and I'm watching, I'm eating popcorn." He notably doesn't mention the eating strategy itself, however.

Later, after the interview is over, the hosts of the show discuss how it went, all while munching on popcorn and doing their best impression of Cruise. It seems that his interesting popcorn eating method is bringing more people together than it is dividing them. And seeing him snacking in a goofy way is much better than watching Tom Cruise puke from eating chocolate cake for three days like he did while filming "The Outsiders," so we'll take this as a net positive. (But speaking of cake in a much nicer sense, Tom Cruise is known for gifting a delicious coconut cake at Christmas.)