Her jaw-dropping performance in The Substance has earned her her first Oscar nomination, but one of Demi Moore’s earliest films is now causing a stir for a very different reason.
The Hollywood icon, 62, was still a rising star when she landed the lead role in 1984 comedy No Small Affair, playing a 22-year-old nightclub singer who seduces a 16-year-old high school student photographer, played by Jon Cryer.
The film was directed by acclaimed Hollywood director Jerry Schatzberg, 97, whose work is being celebrated this week in a film retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
While the exhibition includes his films starring renowned Hollywood actors such as Meryl Streep and Al Pacino, DailyMail.com can reveal Schatzberg has specifically asked the museum to omit the comedy drama starring Moore.
An email seen by DailyMail.com shows a MoMA curator informing staff ahead of the event: ‘At Jerry’s request, we aren’t showing NO SMALL AFFAIR.’
A friend of Schatzberg’s told DailyMail.com: ‘Jerry came in late to direct the picture and while he liked working with Demi Moore and Jon Cryer, he never felt the script was in decent enough shape.
While Demi Moore is celebrating her first Oscar nomination for her role in The Substance, one of her first movies is being canceled
The actress starred in Jerry Schatzberg’s 1984 comedy film No Small Affair, in which she played a 22-year-old nightclub owner who seduces a 16-year-old student, played by Jon Cryer
‘There are aspects of the film he is embarrassed by and given No Small Affair counts as the least favorite of all the movies he’s made, he has no desire for it to be publicly screened. The memories of its making are too raw.’
No Small Affair, which also starred Jennifer Tilly and Tim Robbins, flopped upon release in 1984.
But the movie acquired subsequent notoriety, when in a case of life imitating art, it was revealed Moore and Cryer had a relationship while making the film.
Moore wrote in her 2019 memoir Inside Out: ‘Jon fell for me in real life, too, and lost his virginity to me while we were making that movie.
‘It pains me to think of how callous I was with his feelings – that I stole what could have been such an important and beautiful moment from him.
‘I was sort of losing it right then, and I was definitely not in a place to take care of someone else’s feelings. I started to do some seriously self-destructive things during that period.’
MoMA is currently screening a film retrospective celebrating Schatzberg’s works
DailyMail.com can reveal Schaztberg specifically requested that No Small Affair be omitted from the exhibition
At the time the movie was shot, Cryer was 18 and Moore 21.
Twice-married Cryer later publicly disputed Moore’s recollections that she was his first sexual partner.
‘Well, the good thing about this is she doesn’t have to feel bad about it anymore, because while I’m sure she was totally justified making that assumption based on my skill level (and the stunned look on my face at the time), I had actually lost my virginity in high school,’ he wrote in a September 2019 Twitter post.
‘But she’s right [about] the other part, I was over the moon for her during a very troubled time in her life. I have nothing but affection for her and not a regret in the world.’
A source close to Schatzberg revealed: ‘The revelations of the affair between Demi and Jon certainly complicate the legacy of No Small Affair but they aren’t the primary factor for Jerry requesting it not being shown at MoMA.
‘The film’s production and how the movie turned out was just too chaotic an experience for Jerry to take pride in.’
Cryer, now 59, elaborated on his fling with Demi Moore in his book, So That Happened, published in 2015.
Schatzberg, 97, had joined the 1984 film project as a replacement for director Martin Ritt and considers it ‘the least favorite of all the movies he’s made’
The movie was a box office flop but would acquire subsequent notoriety, when in a case of life imitating art, it was revealed Moore and Cryer had dated during the film
Jon Cryer and co-star Demi Moore in a still from No Small Affair
He wrote: ‘She got the part and very kindly offered to show me around town, as she knew that I was an innocent to Hollywood nightlife.
‘The evening was a bit of a blur, probably because at one point she kissed me. And as there is simply no way to overstate my wonderment at this event, my mind still has difficulty processing it.’
Cryer added: ‘I fell for her hard. As an inaugural Hollywood romance, Demi was a gas: fun, engaging and and stylish…she took me out to dinners and parties and introduced me to her crowd.’
But the affair fizzled out when Cryer went to her house in West Hollywood, only to be told by Moore’s housekeeper that she was out with her boyfriend.
He revealed in his memoir that he was still shooting the film after they had broken up: ‘Though I was still smarting from the breakup, I took pride in the fact that if Demi hadn’t picked me, in a way, the movies had…for a brief exciting period, though, Demi Moore was my first big Hollywood romance, and it stands as a mostly fond, fun memory.’
No Small Affair was shown at the New Beverly Cinema in Los Angeles – a repertory cinema owned by Quentin Tarantino – as part of its 2017 season of Schatzberg’s films.
Moore reunited with former co-stars Jon Cryer, Andrew McCarthy, and Ally Sheedy at the red carpet premiere of BRATS at the 2024 Tribeca Film Festival
Schatzberg was a late replacement on the project for director Martin Ritt who was supposed to have made the film with Matthew Broderick and Sally Field before the production was shut down by its producers.
Cryer was then cast alongside Ellen Barkin but Schatzberg deemed them to have insufficient chemistry and he replaced Barkin with Moore.
Further complicating matters, production had to be shut down for a week during filming after Cryer contracted throat infection and mono.
The edgy romance was released two years after Moore was seen sharing passionate kisses with a 15-year-old boy in footage first aired on Entertainment Tonight.
Then-19-year-old Moore was filmed kissing her General Hospital co-star Philip Tanzini at his 15th birthday party. First posted on YouTube in 2012, the five-minute montage recently went viral after resurfacing on social media.
Moore is the favorite of many Hollywood insiders to win an Oscar for her acclaimed turn in the critically-acclaimed body horror film, The Substance for which she won a Golden Globe last month.
She played Elisabeth Sparkle, a famed aerobics instructor who takes a black-market drug that can create a ‘younger, more beautiful, more perfect’ version of its user.
Moore is in contention for the Oscar against Cynthia Erivo, Mikey Madison, Fernanda Torres and Karla Sofía Gascon.
The Substance is up for five awards in total on Oscars night, after also scoring nods for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Makeup and Hairstyling.
Movies that do feature in MoMA’s Schatzberg series this week in midtown Manhattan include 1973’s Scarecrow, starring Al Pacino and Gene Hackman, and 1987’s Street Smart featuring Morgan Freeman and Christopher Reeve.
