Cruise talks to strangers

LONDON: Actor Tom Cruise, in London for the British premiere of his latest movie, Minority Report, Wednesday evening, spent 90 minutes signing autographs and talking on fans' cell phones.

Three thousand people had packed Leicester Square in the center of the capital's entertainment district hoping Cruise would do his customary mingling with the crowd.

The 39-year-old actor arrived at the Odeon cinema sporting a brace on his teeth. He said a dentist advised him to wear it four months ago when he took children Isabella, 9, and Connor, 7, to a routine appointment.

"I've had difficulty closing my mouth my whole life and when I went to the dentist he said he could fix it for me," Cruise said. "Twenty minutes later I came out with this on and I don't think it's a problem."

Talking to strangers on fans' cell phones was not a problem, he said, although it was sometimes difficult to get the people on the other end of the line to believe it was really him.

"It's great fun to chat to people's friends and family members on the phone. I just say 'hello, how are you', but most of the time they don't believe it's me. So sometimes they hang up on me," he said.

Cruise, in a gunmetal gray suit and sunglasses, shook hundreds of hands as he tried to reach a large part of the crowd outside the cinema and also took time to sign autographs. -- AP