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Tom Cruise: Christmas Shopping for Suri

Hollywood's most famous dad talks stuffed animals and dolls, The Sound of Music and his new World War II thriller, Valkyrie

By Marc Malkin Dec 12, 2008 3:18 PMTags
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What does Suri Cruise want from Santa Claus?

"You know, she likes to color," her dad, Tom Cruise, tells me in an exclusive interview. "She likes dolls, stuffed animals. She's really easy about stuff like that."

Sounds like shopping for daughter Bella, 16, and son Connor, 13, won’t be too hard either.

"A cool pair of sneakers, different books that they like," Cruise says of their wish list. "They're kind of like, 'Look, it's been a busy year and we're just looking forward to some quiet time, just hangin' out.' "

Of course, he and Katie Holmes have been anything but quiet recently...

Frank Connor/United Artists, Inc

He continues, "I grew up looking at the Holocaust and always thought, 'Why didn't they just shoot him?' What I find inspiring is that there were people who stood up against this and wanted to stop him...They really went to that extent and risked everything to stop it."

Next up on Cruise's plate could be something completely different: a musical. "I'd like to do it as a film," he says of his plans for some big-screen song and dance. "Kate loves musicals. Suri loves them. And I'll never forget going to The Sound of Music when I was a kid. My mother was working and it was us four kids. It was a big thing in our family...It was a big afternoon for us."

And there’s something else he’s never done—an animated flick. "We all love those Pixar and DreamWorks [movies]," he says. "But I haven't found one that I said, 'Yeah, I'm gonna do it.' But yeah, I would do it."

In a couple of weeks, however, he and Holmes have the holidays to think about. They’re not sure where they’ll be spending them, but the place they’ve called home for the past few months is looking like a definite possibility. Since relocating to New York for Holmes’ Broadway gig, they’ve actually been living in the first apartment that Cruise ever bought after he made Risky Business.

“I love that time of year there,” Cruise says of New York. “It’s magic.”