Tom Cruise: 'Ali Was My Childhood Hero'
21 December 2008
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Actor Tom Cruise fulfilled a lifetime ambition when he met boxing legend Muhammad Ali at a gala event.Cruise admits the three-time World Heavyweight Champion was his hero as a kid, and he was an emotional wreck when he finally had the chance to meet him at Time Magazine 75th Anniversary Gala in 1998.The star says, "I got to meet my hero when I was growing up, Muhammad Ali. And I got to toast him at an event."Ali was the guy when I was growing up".Cruise's best pal Will Smith played Ali in a 2001 biopic.Meanwhile the actress Tom Cruise was so desperate to see his Hollywood heroes on the silver screen as a kid he took a job bagging-up ice in a freezer.The movie star idolised Clint Eastwood and late actor Paul Newman as a youngster - and got to work at age eight to scrape up enough cash to watch his heroes in action.He told U.S. talkshow host David Letterman, "There was a store up the street that had this sign that said 'Kid needed to bag ice', so I went up there one day. I wanted money so I could go to the movies and (the store owner) put me in this machine."I was thinking beforehand, 'He wouldn't tell me to do this if it wasn't safe' - so I was in there, you got paid per bag, he closed the thing down and he dressed you in this plastic outfit and plastic gloves.
"I'm jamming the ice in there and after about 15 minutes my legs started to go numb. Every bag I'm thinking, 'OK, I've got the ticket for the movie, now I need the popcorn... my hands and my leg were so numb I could barely open the door... I wanted my own cash at eight".
Ali was the guy when I was growing up
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