3 days ago
Armie Hammer's father's bizarre dying wish involving Tom Cruise is finally revealed 3 years after his death
Armie Hammer 's oil tycoon father Michael Hammer died of cancer in late 2022.
But before the 67-year-old succumbed to the disease, he made his dying wish known — and it involves Hollywood heavyweight Tom Cruise.
The patriarch reportedly had the 62-year-old Mission: Impossible star as one of his top two choices to to portray him in a feature film about his infamous early 2000s art scandal.
Per Page Six, director Barry Avrich — who helmed the 2021 Netflix documentary Made You Look — said the late gallery owner was also open to his 38-year-old disgraced son playing him.
'We were, and still are, shopping the scripted version… and [Michael] felt he should be played by either Tom Cruise or Armie, his son. He offered to introduce me to both,' Avrich revealed.
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The report that Cruise was one of Hammer's top choices arrives as the actor's new film Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning has been swamped for two weeks in a row by Disney's live-action remake of Lilo & Stitch.
Despite that, the stunt-heavy film had the best debut for the series to date and has blasted past the $350 million benchmark at the global box office.
The filmmaker Avrich is gearing up to release a book about the art forgery scandal, titled The Devil Wears Rothko, on June 10.
Michael was the owner of Manhattan-based Knoedler Gallery, which shuttered in 2011 after being accused of selling millions in counterfeit art pieces.
A Mark Rothko painting sold for over $17 million in 2004, but it was later found to have been forged. The gallery had been Manhattan's oldest exhibition space.
Knoedler & Co. would eventually confess to unwittingly selling 31 phony pieces, including art by Rothko and Jackson Pollock.
Former gallery director Ann Freedman had previously procured the expensive works from a dealer named Glafira Rosales.
Avrich said he sees 75-year-old Meryl Streep depicting Freedman if the movie comes to fruition.
Fake art schemes are still an issue in the art world — Barry recalled that 'a prominent Chelsea Gallery' offered to host his book launch party, but withdrew the invitation after learning the book's title.
'The gallery director saw the book title and said they have not been immune in dealing with fakes,' he dished to Page Six.
Aside from Armie, Michael is survived by his wife Misty and younger son Viktor, 36.
He also left behind ex-wife Dru Ann Mobley, Armie and Viktor's mother. The pair divorced in 2012 after 27 years of marriage.
Best known for his ties to family firm Occidental Petroleum, Michael reportedly inherited a $40 million fortune from his late grandfather, industrialist Armand Hammer, who ran the company until his death in 1990.
His death came just months after Armie — once among Hollywood's A-list elite until a cannibalism scandal unraveled his career — traveled back to Los Angeles from the Cayman Islands, where he was spotted selling timeshares at a resort amid his fall from grace.
Armie now hosts the Armie HammerTime Podcast, where he 'sits down with extraordinary people from all walks of life as he rebuilds his own.'
