Leah Remini has had a lot going on in her personal life the last few years. Her daughter went off to college, Leah herself enrolled at NYU for a liberal arts associate’s program, she sued the Church of Scientology for harassment and defamation, and she and her husband divorced after 21 years of marriage. That’s a lot! So it’s no surprise that she’s been pretty quiet lately. But she’s speaking up now, and the timing couldn’t be better. Just as Tom Cruise’s Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning is breaking box office records, Leah is here to remind us that the stunt queen is A) still a Scientologist, and B) hugely benefiting from the “church” doing extensive dirty work on his behalf, to keep his reputation (and ego) squeaky clean. Well played, Leah. I’d call that mission accomplished. Furthermore, Leah tells Us Weekly that she doubts Tom Cruise could function “in the real world” without COS covering his ass.
But even after more than a decade of speaking out, the actress says the Church still holds a powerful grip on some of Hollywood’s biggest names, many of whom continue to stay silent or benefit from the institution’s vast resources. At the top of that list, she says, is Tom Cruise, who remains the Church’s most prominent ambassador — and, according to Remini, its most protected. “Can you imagine Tom being in a normal world? Like, without Scientology doing his dirty work for him? No,” she tells Us Weekly of the Mission: Impossible star, who maintains a close friendship with Church leader David Miscavige.
Remini claims Cruise has long relied on Scientology to protect his public image, with the organization going as far as to orchestrate his breakup with former girlfriend Nazanin Boniadi in the mid-2000s and suppress damaging media coverage. “He’s given enormous power,” she tells Us. “This man who has a multi-million-dollar organization using all its resources to stop a book being written about him.”
According to Remini, when her Aftermath cohost Mike Rinder, a former senior member of the Church, left in 2007, he took thousands of documents with him. Among those, she alleges, there were “hundreds” demonstrating how Cruise’s team worked to shut down news stories — even people planning to fly skywriting over a movie premiere. “They used all kinds of resources because they couldn’t risk Tom’s precious eyes seeing that,” she adds.
…In recent years, both Cruise and [John] Travolta have been noticeably quieter about their beliefs, but Remini doesn’t think that signals a change of heart. “They’re being exposed for what they truly believe in,” she says. “And they realized, ‘We better shut up, or we’re not going to have careers.’ But that doesn’t mean they aren’t still in full agreement with what the Church does.”
Asked if she believes any of these celebrity members will ever walk away, Remini doesn’t sound hopeful. “I used to hope a lot of these people would leave,” she admits. “But I kind of feel like they need Scientology. I don’t know if they’d make it in the real world.”
Again, thank you Leah for these timely comments. I’m a bitch who holds a grudge, so whenever I see Tom Cruise pop up I can’t get past his Scientology association, let alone his status at the top of that cult. But he is savvy, and Cruise conducts himself in a way that makes it easy for people to turn a blind eye to COS. LaineyGossip had a nuanced take a couple weeks ago, noting how Cruise will show up to press junkets early and make time to speak with everyone in the line. “That’s what makes talking about Tom Cruise complicated for some members of the media. He’s a weirdo, no doubt. But if a weirdo has shown you a kindness, it’s hard to forget.” Bingo. And there’s plenty more acts of generosity Cruise does, like mentoring up-and-comers, or his infamous Christmas coconut cake list. And hey, these thoughtful traits may genuinely be part of his personality. But it’s also a pretty slick tactic for shielding himself from Scientology heat. And like Leah said, I don’t think Cruise is ever leaving COS at this point.
Switching topics, can someone please explain to me the “haircut” Cruise has sported the last several years? It isn’t his worst offense, but still…
photos credit: JIMMY JAMES/Avalon, Getty and via Instagram
I don’t think he can actually leave at this point. COS has too much power over him.
Yup.
The COS even scared the crap out of JFK Jr with their intimidation tactics, and he had friends in Washington!!!
Leah’s best friend and podcast co-host, Mike Rinder, who’s mentioned in the article and who has been right there with her battling Scientology, died from cancer at the beginning of the year. So she really has gone through it recently
That dude was a warrior.
RIP Mike Rinder.
He was in it since he was a TEEN, back when L Ron Hubbard was on a boat avoiding arrest.
He dedicated his whole life, he and his sea org wife put their children in the “cadet org” – allowing them to be well, not raised by parents.
He was part of the sinking Cruise’s marriage to Nicole Kidman and turning the kids against their mom b/c she was an “SP” (suppressive person).
And after being mentally tortured by Miscavige for years, he actually got out.
Built a life with another former scientologist, had a kid, and fought alongside Leah.
Leaving something that is all you ever knew, is unimaginable to most people, no matter how bad it got.
Some of the main reasons scientology is no longer viable as a growing entity are Leah Thompson, Mike Rinder, and Marty Rathbone (who later, allegedly, took a huge payout to shut up).
Scientology had people following all of them for YEARS.
They have tons of money, and no one to spend it on (new people)
But their PI budget has got to be millions.
I watched the Aftermath show.
I cannot watch Tom Cruise in anything. Travolta either.
Just- so many horrors.
Leah Remini- obv.
Not lea thompson. My mind is a weird place. and i saw a clip of back to the future yesterday.
More like he has power over them …and why would anybody give up that kind of power? It’s his own fiefdom.
There’s NO way Tom could AFFORD to leave COS when you factor in the FREE LABOR he gets from the members who serve him…😡
He can well afford it, he chooses not to. He only pays for supplies. Everything else is labor ‘donated’ by the members in honor of him.
The only thing stopping me from being a Tom Cruise fan is the Scientology thing. It took me a long time to watch the Mission Impossible movies because of it. I’ll admit that I enjoy the franchise but what Leah says is probably true. It’s been reported that Tom Cruise lives on the Scientology estate in the UK.
This hits such a nerve with me because I hate scientology but have been lulled into forgetting that while enjoying the “MI” franchise. I’m just confounded by the outstanding choices they make with actresses, but maybe that’s not him?
I think the greatest testament to Tom Cruise’s acting skills is that he manages to play a convincing “great guy” every day of his public life. Like, if you read those occasional Buzzfeed articles about people with positive experiences meeting celebs, Cruise is always in there somewhere: paying for someone’s meal, remembering the extras’ names on set and standing up for them, taking time to chat with fans when he doesn’t have to. With everything we know about his relationship with Scientology (not to mention the way he treated Katie Holmes and essentially abandoned their daughter), it’s genuinely chilling.
Tom is REALLY good at being a celebrity. His personality is to be hardcore about everything.
re: Tom Cruise’s hair: my sister and I think that’s not his hair, but a very bad wig
Real or not, I think it’s supposed to distract from all of the work that he’s had done on his face. (It’s not working.)
Yea I think the hair is to distract from plastic surgery maybe some scars around the ears, hairline etc
At least Travolta finally ditched the awful wig.
There was a good article in pajiba a few weeks ago about how Tom deliberately reinvented his public image over the course of several years to be all about the MI franchise and being the last real movie star and a force out to save cinema in this age of streaming. Before that, his reputation had tanked due to him being such a weirdo and so closely and openly associated with scientology. With the COS losing power and influence in recent years, with guys like Danny Masterson going from thinking they were free and clear to drug and rape as many women as they want because the cult had the power to protect them and silence their victims, to being convicted and sentenced to decades in prison because actually the cult isn’t that powerful anymore, the more prominent celebrity members have really toned down their association in their public life.
I avoid going to see his films in the theater. But, as usual, I saw the new top gun movie and the last MI movie on a plane. They were good. But again the scientology thing is really really messed up and I just won’t go see it in the theater. I’m not sure watching it on a plane is any less supportive though at the end of the day.
I’ll watch his movies despite how much I hate Scientology and his association with it, but mostly because the more recent ones have been ensembles with other actors I like and good special effects. His character is like a live action figure. The days when he could carry a movie like “Jerry Maguire,” playing a sympathetic central figure in a real human drama or romance, are long gone for me. He’s charismatic and a good actor but I cannot see past how disturbing his private life is.
A friend of mine lost his sister to Scientology for years. She and her husband were in it and basically kept hostage, made to clean dishes and generally do grunt work for higher-ups. It’s a disgusting cult.
I respect Leah so much for her courage and tenaciousness in going after these cult monsters. I don’t care how entertaining his movies are there’s no way I can stand watching him. Unfortunately, he still has a career.
I just don’t like him. Being apart of Scientology is like being an evangelical maga and I am not interested in supporting any of that shit.
He can kick rocks.
A big piece of this is COS protecting the fact he is, at the very least, bi-curious. I find his romantic scenes with women uncomfortable and cringe, but his buddy scenes with men play like love scenes.
Personally, I think that’s John Travolta not Tom. I think Tom is just asexual. But knew how important it was to be seen as a sex symbol to the general public. I will never forget those recorded calls that were caught by the shady PI years ago. Poor Nicole was just dying on the vine since he was so cold to her. And he was just trying to placate her to keep the peace. He wanted his image to stay in tact. Until HE decided to file for divorce years later. With the Scientology machine trying to trash her image.
Anyone who has claimed he is gay has been sued. He has never lost.
I think it’s best for Tom to just pretend his leading ladies in movies are his girlfriends for publicity. As far as I know he has never had a relationship since Katie. I hope he just leaves women alone.
can we just stop with the “he’s gay” slurs — “at the very least bi-curious” is still a thinly veiled swipe. There are enough things about Tom Cruise to find fault with and we really should know better by now.
Why would a flaming narcissist leave a ‘religion’ he is treated as a God. He is #2 to the midget.
I had hope with Suri that might be a glimmer of hope he would leave to have a relationship with his child.
But he got in line and severed the relationship when Katie was labeled a suppressed person. And anyone connected to her are SPs. There was grumbling within the community why he could still see Suri when others could not. Who had SP labels.
So proud of children of A listers changing their last names as a F U to their Fathers. Tom, Brad… etc…
It’s a wig, no?!?
Weird but refreshing to finally have an article on this website calling out Tom Cruise for being a cult member and constantly using his fame to make more propaganda for it. Let’s not forget that this guy enrolled both of his oldest children in his cult and completely cut his youngest daughter out of his life because her mother had the good sense to refuse that her child be enrolled as well.
I can’t watch even the MI movies having read about how Scientology workers had to fix his boat, customize his motorcycles, etc., for a pittance.
He’s a creep.
Leah Remini, however, is a hero.
You know how some famous women get bangs and lots of short layers around their face to make it harder to see wrinkles, and to distracting the eye from noticing new surgery or Botox? Tom’s hair is the old man equivalent. The hair obscures his forehead, casts shadows around his eyes so it’s harder to tell when his Botox is wearing off, and conceals any asymmetry from aging, fillers, and surgery. He’s done so much to his face that would be all anyone talked about if he had close-cut Top Gun hair.
Where is Shelly Miscavige? David Miscavige’s missing wife? Is she buried in the desert somewhere? Shivering in a trailer? This cult is abusive maniacal evil absurd and horrifying. How do they have tax free status? You’re ALL Monsters. Every last God forsaken one of you church of scientology scumbags are sick monsters. What are you a part of? A con, a grift, abuse and murder. You suck. I can’t wait for your whole weak rotten house of lies to fall. Where is Shelly Miscavige? Where is Shelly? Where is Shelly? David???? You are scum.