tom cruise crazy days and nights

How Celebrity Gossip Site Crazy Days And Nights Went QAnon

“I don’t care about made up satanism or pedo rings… The very first post I read here was about Gary Busey trying to use gold doubloons as legitimate currency and tbh I would just like more of that please.”

BuzzFeed News Reporter

It was early June and “Penny Farthing” had finally had enough.

“I’ve been a faithful reader of this site since like 2008 but I have just about had enough of the QAnon garbage that gets posted lately. The very first post I read here was about Gary Busey trying to use gold doubloons as legitimate currency and tbh I would just like more of that please.”

Posted to the celebrity gossip blog Crazy Days and Nights, the remark distilled the frustration many readers had been feeling as scandalous tidbits of Hollywood intrigue got crowded out by what another longtime reader described as “ludicrous QAnon horror stories lifted from Twitter.”

The post Penny Farthing was replying to was a "blind item" claiming an actor had forced his friend to join a “rape club” (commenters guessed it referred to Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt ). Another was an item about Bill Gates using the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to test experimental new foods on people in developing nations. Multiple posts have accused Tom Hanks , a frequent Q target, of licentious behavior on a yacht belonging to Hollywood mogul David Geffen. And an ongoing parade of posts describe Hollywood stars abusing minors.

Since 2006, people have come to CDaN for blind items that run the gamut from true ( Kaley Cuoco getting divorced) to ridiculous ( Beyoncé faked her pregnancies ) to fantastical ( Anna Wintour and Bob Marley had a secret baby together ). The site has a well-earned reputation for being both prescient and endlessly entertaining, so it was hardly surprising that its devotees were irked by blind items that seemed to refer to QAnon, the collective delusion that (I can’t believe I’m writing this) a satanic cabal of Trump-hating, child-abusing, moneyed elites runs American politics and media.

Blind items are a form of gossip where the actual name of the person is left out and some of the details are obscured. It’s like a game: In the comments, readers can guess who the celebrity might be. For example, “this one-named A+ list foreign-born singer is about to release an album” (Adele). This mechanism is oddly similar to QAnon’s, which also involves a pseudonymous insider posting cryptic message “drops” about famous people.

“I stopped reading when the Q stuff started,” Annie Tomlin, a former CDaN fan, told BuzzFeed News. “It’s really disturbing to see this right-wing conspiracy theory bullshit show up in gossip.”

{ "id": 127969098 } “I have no doubt whoever came up with Q has read my site at some point.”

Tomlin is hardly alone in thinking there might be some weird political agenda behind negative items about celebrities from the political left — Chrissy Teigen, Tom Hanks, Robert De Niro. A poster to the pop culture message board Datalounge wrote , “The site is custom made for right wingers, people who hate Hollywood and loudmouthed liberals with a passion. That’s indeed a common strategy by the alt-right to level pedophilia accusations at any detractor to destroy their credibility.”

Viewed through a political lens, QAnon is a far-right absurdity with a surreal and terrifying real-world reach . But viewed through a celebrity gossip lens, it seems to make a little more sense. Hollywood elites engaging in morally repugnant or taboo sex? Facing no repercussions for bad actions? Using their fame and money to silence those who might reveal their misdeeds? This is practically conventional wisdom. Gossip fans and QAnoners share a core belief: that behind closed doors, celebrities are doing unspeakable things.

Crazy Days and Nights might not be trafficking in hardcore Q dogma, but there’s a Q dog whistle somewhere in the background if you listen for it. And whether intentional or not, it’s made the long-running blog a favorite of actual QAnon adherents who see it as reinforcing their elaborate shared delusion.

And that’s not particularly surprising to Enty, the name under which CDaN’s creator publishes. “I have no doubt whoever came up with Q has read my site at some point,” he told BuzzFeed News.

VickyQMerriKayID4 @q_id4 From Crazy Days and Nights. Take it with a grain of salt, still, interesting 02:18 AM - 28 Oct 2020 Reply Retweet Favorite

Enty, who purports to be an entertainment lawyer in Hollywood, started Crazy Days and Nights back in 2006. It has never had the name recognition of peers from the mid-aughts like Perez Hilton’s blog, but it has a loyal cult following among gossip fans. Gen Z discovered the blog through TikTok, where some creators have gone viral for discussing its blind item posts.

Anne Helen Petersen, a historian of celebrity gossip (and former BuzzFeed News reporter), said it’s not surprising that the readers of Crazy Days and Nights might also follow QAnon, and vice versa.

According to Petersen, blind item fans “think of gossip as a puzzle they can solve. When you think of the people who love QAnon, devouring those drops, that’s what they love. There’s pleasure in that analytical puzzle solving, and that translates very easily from Save the Children or Q to Crazy Days and Nights.”

Problem is, there’s a nasty gulf between the two. Celebrity gossip is typically harmless (though perhaps not for targeted celebrities ) and unlikely to inspire a coordinated assault on the US Capitol. Real Housewives fans probably wouldn’t wear a horned bearskin headdress and carry a spear on a visit to Congress.

{ "id": 127969089 } “Enty was the best until he got Q-pilled.”

But in the Hollywood sexual harassment scandals, CDaN and Q found common ground: the real or imagined shitty behavior of powerful men.

“A weird thing happened post-#MeToo where CDaN and old-school casting couch stuff, which has always been at the core of CDaN, crossed paths with QAnon,” Troy McEady, cohost of the celebrity gossip podcast Beyond the Blinds , said. “And now they exist in the same world, so it’s become hard to navigate.”

Too hard, for some.

“Eventually the tone shifted from being silly blinds about celebs being awful on sets or partying too hard or cheating to child abuse, yachting, sexual assault, and QAnon,” one former reader told BuzzFeed News. “That’s when I stopped reading.”

Tara Giancaspro was another formerly enthusiastic CDaN reader until the site’s shift toward conspiracy turned her off. “I started to feel that Enty had an agenda or a value system that went beyond neutral reporting on celebrity high jinks.”

Another former CDaN reader was a bit more pointed in a remark they posted to Reddit: “Enty was the best until he got Q-pilled.”

Commenters on the blog guessing that a blind item about child trafficking was about George Clooney.

Commenters on Crazy Days and Nights believing in some sort of cabal.

Enty denies this, vehemently.

In an interview, the pseudonymous author of the site told BuzzFeed News any appearance of a connection between QAnon and CDaN is a coincidence. If it seems like there have been a lot of items about child predators on the site, maybe that’s just because there are a lot of child predators in Hollywood, he said. And by the way, he added, there is no political slant to the site. He typically passes on political tips and will post one “only if it’s celeb adjacent, or if it’s somebody both sides want to talk about, like Matt Gaetz.”

Enty has a more professional quibble with QAnon: the quality of the drops. “What makes a good blind item is if you only have two or three possibilities, not 100,” he explained. “But with Q posts, you could go any direction with those.”

{ "id": 127969092 } “I don’t believe in lizard people, but I’m willing to believe there’s a cabal.”

Enty insists he’s not a Q follower, though he did admit to being familiar with Q lore. (“Sure, I’ve seen some. It wasn’t an everyday thing — it wasn’t like I had an alert on my phone.”) So any appearance that CDaN has gone Q is really more an issue of overlapping worldviews, he said. To Crazy Days and Nights, Hollywood is a liberal Gomorrah, full of extramarital sex, child sexual abuse, cult recruitment, gold diggers, drugs, rape, and the misdeeds of hypocritical, virtue-signaling stars. To the QAnon deluded, it's pretty much the same thing.

“Everyone believes in one conspiracy theory,” said Mia Bloom, professor of communication and Middle East studies at Georgia State University and coauthor of the book Pastels and Pedophiles: Inside the Mind of QAnon . “People who are radical think in shades of black and white. But with QAnon, we’re seeing people say, ‘OK, I don’t believe in lizard people, but I’m willing to believe there’s a cabal.’”

Internet celebrity gossip requires its readers to be slightly conspiratorially minded — to believe there’s something happening beyond what’s printed in Us Weekly. But Enty is more open to conspiracy than most — that’s how he built one of the most influential celebrity gossip sites on the internet. And perhaps that's why CDaN seems to have collided with the QAnon delusion: Maybe the instincts that make for a compelling celebrity gossip site are the same ones that make for a compelling political conspiracy. Chief among them is a forced credulity.

“Do I believe the moon landing was staged? No,” Enty said. “But I’m willing to listen to the arguments. I’m willing to have the discussion. It’s Buzz Aldrin who will punch you in the mouth if you say it’s fake.” ●

Correction: Tara Giancaspro's name was misspelled and the title of the podcast Beyond the Blinds was misstated in a previous version of this post.

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• Internet Culture

Saturday, July 16, 2022

Blind items revealed #1.

July 8, 2022

This foreign born A list dual threat actor finally completed the privacy wall at his home. There were many hoops to jump through at the city to get a permit to do so. He didn't want the apartment building next door to be able to look into his yard. If you take a close look at the permit application, which is public, the two names listed as owners on the request are the actor and his alliterate friend. The soon to be mother of his child is nowhere to be found.

Tom Hiddleston/Charlie Cox/Zawe Ashton

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Tom Cruise’s daily routine

Updated Jan. 25, 2023

Tom Cruise is a household name and a true Hollywood icon. His dedication to his craft is well-known, but what about his commitment to health and fitness?

Cruise is just as committed to maintaining his physique as his acting career. And it's no wonder since this dedication and discipline have helped him maintain his lucrative Hollywood career .

Inside a day in the life of Tom Cruise

Key takeaways.

• Cruise avoids junk and oily food, indulging in cheat meals on rare occasions.
• He eats 15 light micro-meals throughout the day instead of large meals.
• Cruise dedicates his afternoons to workouts and a range of adventurous activities.
• He takes time to relax and recover in the evenings, taking at least two days off from weekly workouts.

Cruise eats a healthy breakfast of oatmeal, egg whites, and chicken in the mornings.

He also includes a dose of protein in the form of whey or other supplements. Cruise snacks on nutritious items like nuts and fruits throughout the day to keep his energy levels up.

It has been reported that the clean-cut actor sticks to a diet that includes mostly fish, chicken, and vegetables, with a maximum of 1,200 calories and limited carbs.

He avoids junk and oily food and only indulges in cheat meals on rare occasions. The actor stays away from carbohydrates and avoids eating large meals, instead consuming fifteen light micro-meals throughout the day.

Afternoons are dedicated to Cruise’s workouts. While he may not be a gym fan, he incorporates cardio and weight training into his training routine.

When asked by MAartial.com , what he did to keep fit, Cruise said, "Sea-kayaking, caving … fencing, treadmill, weights … rock-climbing, hiking. I jog. I do so many different activities."

In addition, Cruise engages in more traditional physical activities like tennis, jogging, and cycling to stay active.

In the evenings, Cruise winds down and relaxes. He knows the importance of giving his muscles time to recover, so he takes at least two days off from weekly workouts.

Cruise’s routine balances healthy eating and regular exercise, focusing on versatility and enjoyment. He doesn’t follow extreme diets or workout plans but instead keeps things simple and adapts his routine to the demands of his movie roles.

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Anonymous celebrity gossip blogger's identity is EXPOSED by 'mistress' who he claims lied about being pregnant and accused him of molesting her daughter

• California attorney John Robert Nelson, also known as 'Enty Lawyer' author of the Crazy Days and Nights (CDaN) blog/podcast was forced to reveal his identity 
• His former lover, Cassandra Crose, a podcaster and single mother of three exposed him last year
• The pair have been in a messy court battle since November 2023 as she claims he abused and harassed her, allegations he denies 

The identity of an anonymous celebrity gossip blogger has been exposed by his alleged mistress - who he claims lied about being pregnant and falsely accused him of molesting her daughter.  

California attorney John Robert Nelson, also known as 'Enty Lawyer' author of the Crazy Days and Nights (CDaN) blog, was forced to reveal his identity in a Florida  courtroom last year after Cassandra Crose, the woman he was having an extramarital affair exposed him, The Daily Beast reported. 

Crose, a podcaster has been entangled in a messy court battle with Nelson that was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida in November 2023. She claimed in a court filing that he abused and harassed her, allegations he denies.

Nelson, a married father of two daughters, who once ran for Congress  as a Democrat in 2018, met Crose when she purchased time to promote her podcast, 'Cassandra Explains It All' on his blog. His blog settled a defamation lawsuit with Real Housewife of Beverly Hills Diana Jenkins in 2023 but was ahead of the curve with publishing allegations about predator Harvey Weinstein . 

Crose, a single mother of three, began a relationship with with Nelson but claimed she was unaware that he was married.

Nelson alleged that when Crose learned that he and his wife were taking her to court she went on social media and on her podcast to unmask him- telling listeners who the Enty Law was, the complaint states.

The Crazy Days & Nights blog was launched by Nelson in 2006, and years later he added a podcast. 

It is unclear if Nelson practices law or was ever an entertainment lawyer that he apparently claims on his blog.

In the court filing in Florida state court, Nelson admitted to giving Crose hush money - at least $1,500 a month - to keep her from revealing his online persona. 

He also alleged that he stayed in the relationship for fear that she would expose him and go after his family.

Some of his allegations cited in the complaint, included her calling and texting him - up to hundred times a day - that he described as 'explosive, violent and threatening.' 

The barrage of threats, he claimed, prompted him to get a restraining order that was later denied by the court. The judge advised the Nelsons to 'obtain legal advice and assistance or representation by a lawyer,' as per the publication.

On December 5, the initial case was closed and Nelson filed a new case against his former mistress in Pinellas County court, which is pending.

Crose, who said she is a victim of domestic violence, claims Nelson was abusive and violent during their relationship, and was choked, slapped, and hit by him -  without consent.

The podcaster shared her history of eating disorders. She claims Nelson was obsessive about her weight and asked her to regularly send him photos of herself on a scale. She said she lost 35 pounds during the time they were together.

Crose shared an audio recording with The Daily Beast, where Nelson is heard sexually fantasizing about physically abusing her for eating unhealthy foods, and striking her with a belt. 

Crose's podcast 'Drenched in Drama' features a slew of episodes directed at Nelson including, 'Enty Lawyer the QAnon Grifter,'  'Enty Lawyer's Double Life,' 'Enty Liar Timeline.' 

Her most recent episode was on February 5 entitled, 'Enty Lawyer Abuse Allegations' where she spends 34 minutes talking about the 'amended and detailed order' she filed against her former lover.

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Knight and Day

A young woman gets mixed up with a disgraced spy who is trying to clear his name. A young woman gets mixed up with a disgraced spy who is trying to clear his name. A young woman gets mixed up with a disgraced spy who is trying to clear his name.

• James Mangold
• Patrick O'Neill
• Cameron Diaz
• Peter Sarsgaard
• 482 User reviews
• 251 Critic reviews
• 46 Metascore
• 3 nominations

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• Director George

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• Frank Jenkins

• (as Jack A. O'Connell)

• Randy Mechanic
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Did you know

• Trivia With the exception of Roy Miller falling off during the rooftop chase in Austria, Tom Cruise did most of the running and jumping without any wire works.
• Goofs When June is taken to Antonio's home in Seville, Spain, the city is celebrating the festival of San Fermin. Part of that is the famous running of the bulls, which happens in Pamplona, not Seville. Pamplona is in northern Spain; Seville is in southern Spain.

Roy Miller : Nobody follow us or I kill myself and then her!

• Crazy credits The film's title appears at the very end of the closing credits.
• Alternate versions An 'Extended Cut' is available in Region 2 (UK and Europe), Region 3 (Asia) and Region 4 (Australia & NZ). It adds eight minutes of footage, mostly extended versions of existing scenes, as well as a new opening scene that better establishes June Haven's profession as a mechanic. The 'Extended Cut' was released on Video On Demand in North America, but as of January 2011, it has yet to receive a Region 1 release. (See the FAQ page for more details.)
• Connections Edited into RTL Boulevard: Episode #11.70 (2010)
• Soundtracks Louie Louie Written by Richard Berry Performed by The Kingsmen Courtesy of Kingsmen International Licensing, Inc.

User reviews 482

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• June 23, 2010 (United States)
• United States
• All New Enemies
• Salzburg, Austria
• Twentieth Century Fox
• New Regency Productions
• Pink Machine
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• $117,000,000 (estimated)
• $76,423,035
• $20,139,985
• Jun 27, 2010
• $261,989,769

Technical specs

• Runtime 1 hour 49 minutes
• Dolby Digital
• Dolby Surround 7.1

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Crazy Days and Nights: An Interview with the Elusive 'Enty', King of the Blind Item

Writer, Blogger, Regular contributor to local newpapers in Bergen County, Beauty blogger ,Reality TV Philosopher (stay tuned for my thesis!)

CrazyDaysAndNights.net

A no-frills, anonymous gossip website has gotten to be the talk of Tinsletown...And New York...and so far beyond.

Crazy Days and Nights ( crazydaysandnights.net , commonly referred to as CDAN ) has been around for over a decade and garners millions of page views per months. However, the site only recently came to my attention while I was following the outrageous behind-the-scenes drama of a reality show. Many viewers began to reach out to me and ask: “Have you seen this?” Whether the gossip seemed believable or completely far-fetched, I would end up perusing the CDAN blinds , eager to piece together the clues and figure them out.

I quickly learned that in 2017, CDAN had become more popular than ever before. It turns out that the website alluded to the Kevin Spacey and Harvey Weinstein stories, bringing them to many readers’ attention well-before the accounts became news and #MeToo started trending.

Run by someone who refers to himself as “Enty”, a self-described entertainment lawyer, CDAN’s items are craftily created in a way that leaves you guessing and with a nagging sense of uncertainty. The items are so deliberately murky at times that you’re often wrong in your conjecture. If and when the timing is right, a CDAN blind gets its “reveal” - usually as the big event in Hollywood is happening, or just as the scandal is about to become news.

Once you start perusing the CDAN site, it can become awfully addictive, so consider yourself forewarned! You also quickly discover the competitor websites offering their own blind items (which in my opinion, are not as cleverly worded as CDAN’s). After recently noticing that a salacious post was removed from a CDAN competitor’s site, and subsequently hearing that site may have been served with a Cease and Desist as impetus for that removal, I had to wonder how Enty manages to avoid lawsuits himself.

According to Vanity Fair, https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2016/10/crazy-days-and-nights-enty-interview , CDAN has impressively evaded legal backlash in the years since its inception:

“Enty operates with the belief that he’s under minimal threat of legal repercussion, and he’s used to publicists turning a blind eye to his items. Therefore, he says, no celebrities are immune to being subjects on Crazy Days and Nights. Still, he has a code when it comes to the reveals process. He says he won’t out anyone, he won’t talk about people’s children, and he publishes kindness items about stars who do charitable acts sans publicity: “It’s this whole culture of, ‘Oh, I have to stay in front of the cameras,’” he says. “That’s the kinda behavior I really don’t like. That’s the kind of thing I expose.”

This isn’t uncommon. Each gossip site has its own unique set of rules for its own protection. Unlike Enty, Elaine Lui of LaineyGossip.com protects herself from litigation by never posting reveals and writing her blinds as riddles. “The reason they’re written as a riddle is a form of protection for the source and consequently myself,” Lui told Vanity Fair . Stars’ reps seem to have bigger fish to fry than the people posting the items—they’re just messengers, she reasons.”.

Since Enty is so incredibly elusive, I could only contact him via email. Following is our correspondence for The Huffington Post :

How did you come up with the idea for this site? My readers would love to know some background.

I was bored at work one day and realized I had some stories to share. I didn't think anyone would actually read the site though.

What would you say is your ‘ rule ’ for writing a blind?

Blind items have always been obscure. I'm sure each writer has their own way of writing them. With me, I like to make sure the clues are challenging enough for people. You don't want it to be too easy. I also try to make it like a SAT question. There are several good choices, but there is only one correct choice.

The media recently highlighted that CDAN brought attention to the Weinstein & Spacey stories before they really made the news. Give me a sense of what it’s been like for Crazy Days And Nights in a post Weinstein era?

For the past 11 years, I have been writing blinds and telling stories about the people who do good in Hollywood, but also those that need to be exposed. That mission has been the goal from the first several months. I wanted people to see a side of the entertainment industry that you you never see in the supermarket kiss-butt tabloids. There is no way on this earth that any of those tabloids would do anything to endanger the access to celebrities they think they need to survive. I don't care about access. I don't care about getting some nothing interview about the release of a record or a movie that tells you nothing but what you have agreed to beforehand with multiple layers of bureaucracy surrounding the celebrity.

Who writes for Crazy Days and Nights besides Enty?

I have been writing the site from day one. One guy. If there is ever any other contributions, they are named, whether it be Mr. X or Himmmm. Even accounting for those two, I would guess that I have written about 99% of the approximate 60K posts.

What types of stories are you currently working on?

I don't really work on stories in the sense of some type of timeline. I write about what I can dig up that day. If I don't have enough information about a story or think there might be some more coming in about a topic, I might hold it to see, but there is no planning.

Which types of stories are garnering the most attention? Which get the least? What makes an enticing blind item today?

I think gossip readers each have the things they love the most. Some like Old Hollywood. Some like Kindness items (if a celebrity is involved with a charity or some good cause that they’re not public about). Some like items from the 80's or 90's. I really try and give a mix. The thing is to find not only the right blend, but also things that are juicy enough. I might get 100 tips a day, but maybe 75% are about people no one has heard of. That doesn't mean I don't hang on to them - in case they move up the list - but they need to be known so people have a chance of guessing. They also need to be interesting. So, out of those 100 tips, there might be 4 or 5 that make the lineup for the day combined with things I dig up on my own.

Do major news outlets and investigative journalists reach out to you for information after writing an item? If so, how do you handle their inquiries?

I get contacted a lot by reporters and news outlets. Some of my best friends are reporters or writers. They will often share things with me they don't have enough sources to support or that their editors don't want to run. A lot of those tips have been blockbusters which editors probably wish they had a second chance at.

How would you respond to the critics who say blind items are completely made up?

I can't speak for other blind item sites, but I think that me revealing items on a daily basis for over a decade would show my blind items are real. I would also ask those same critics who write for tabloids how many times Jennifer Aniston was pregnant without having a baby. I would ask the critics who are publicists why they lie for their clients or make up stories that aren't true.

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Disturbing Things We Ignore About Tom Cruise's Life Today

Tom Cruise is easily one of Hollywood's highest-paid actors with an estimated yearly salary of $50 million and an impressive $600 million net worth. But, if his epic COVID-19 rant on the December 2020 set of Mission: Impossible 7 has shown us anything, it's that he's also one of the most controversial. Audio of Cruise yelling at staffers for allegedly not following COVID-19 protocols quickly went viral, but things got awkward when TMZ noted that he himself was not following guidelines. As it turns out, the valve mask Cruise was wearing is not recommended by the CDC because it allows potentially infected droplets to leave the mask.

According to Page Six , five staffers have since quit, and the outburst served as a reminder that much of Hollywood can't stand Tom Cruise . Over the years, the actor has amassed numerous skeletons in his closet, and much of the controversy can be linked back to his ties with the Church of Scientology . In describing his character, Tom DeVocht, a former member of Scientology's internal police, told The Daily Beast that Cruise is "very similar" to Scientology leader David Miscavige because they are "both rather absorbed by themselves, and intensely so. You don't want to look at 'em wrong, say anything wrong, and you definitely don't want to better them in any way," he claimed, concluding, "You had to be very careful around them."

But despite all of the shady stories that exist, the actor continues to work consistently. These are the disturbing things we ignore about Tom Cruise's life today.

Tom Cruise has been accused of using 'slave labor'

Over the past decade, numerous ex-members of the Church of Scientology have accused the church of gross misconduct, and, according to several allegations , Tom Cruise is not free of blame. In fact, former Inspector General Mark Rathbun told R Online in 2011 that he has secret emails proving that a "slave labor force" of Scientologists was forced to build a luxury bus as a gift for Cruise. Then, in 2013, 15 ex-Scientologists signed affidavits in which they claimed that Cruise repeatedly took advantage of members of the church and paid them $1 an hour to carry out a whole slew of jobs for him (via R Online ).

John Brousseau, a former member of the Sea Organization (which is described as a "religious order ... composed of the singularly most dedicated Scientologists"), claimed he was ordered by leader David Miscavige "to do specific projects relating to Tom Cruise" in 2004, like "a complete renovation of his home in Beverly Hills." He was also reportedly ordered to "oversee the construction of a large custom motorhome for Mr. Cruise over a five-month period" and to "assist in the customization and construction of a special limousine for Tom Cruise." Meanwhile, former high-ranking Scientologist Amy Scobee said she had "to locate Scientologists for Tom Cruise's household to cover the positions of nanny, cook, and maid." The documents also alleged that anyone who didn't follow orders was met with inhumane punishments, such as being locked in a bamboo cage.

Does Tom Cruise personally punish fellow Scientologists?

Leah Remini went from proud Scientology member to Scientology whistleblower when she left the church in 2013 and published Troublemaker: Surviving Hollywood and Scientology . Since then, she hasn't stopped sharing horror stories, including ones about the church's most famous member: Tom Cruise. One example? In November 2018, she told The Daily Beast that "Scientologists are told that Tom Cruise is saving the world single-handedly, so he is considered a deity within Scientology."

The actress went on to claim that Cruise "is very aware of the abuses that go on in Scientology. He's been part of it," she said, adding that she's "been told by a senior executive of Scientology, who was there, that [leader] David Miscavige constantly threatened the staff ... with bringing Tom Cruise to Gold Base to kick their f****** a**es." Remini also told the outlet that there was an instance when the actor personally punished a high-ranking member on Miscavige's orders.

The Church of Scientology quickly shut down the allegations, telling ET Canada that "the interview is a PR stunt to promote [Remini's] fake reality TV show." They slammed, "Remini has gone out of her way to manufacture hate and instigate harm toward innocent people."

He met with Ukraine's president at the worst possible time

It was July 25, 2019, and no one could have predicted that a phone call between Ukraine's newly elected president, Volodymyr Zelensky, and US President Donald Trump would spark a media frenzy. CNN dubbed it "the most important day in the impeachment scandal" as the conversation (which was declassified in September 2019) would go on to raise questions of extortion and set off Trump's impeachment trial.

While Zelensky was adamant that there was no blackmail , House Democrats weren't so sure. That's because Trump asked Zelensky "to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine" (i.e., the country's alleged meddling in the 2016 election), as well as to investigate Joe Biden's son . "Whatever you can do ... would be great," Trump told Zelensky, who responded positively, saying, "For me as a President, it is very important and we are open for any future cooperation."

It was right at this time, while Zelensky was making headlines across the globe, that Tom Cruise flew to Ukraine to meet with him. According to Deadline , Cruise had requested permission to shoot a film in Ukraine and was invited to meet with the president (a former actor) first in his Kiev office. Cruise was all smiles during his October visit, despite the controversy surrounding his host. "You're good-looking! Like in a movie," Zelensky told Cruise , who laughed, "It pays the rent." Not the best timing, to say the least.

Is Scientology to blame for his divorces?

Could it be that Scientology is at the root of Tom Cruise's high-profile divorces from Nicole Kidman and Katie Holmes? That's what a number of ex-members claim. Marty Rathbun, a former high-ranking Scientologist, alleged in the 2015 documentary Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief (via The Daily Beast ) that his job "was to facilitate the breakup with Nicole Kidman" because the actress was a non-believer.

Leah Remini corroborated those claims, telling Us Weekly that the Celebrity Centre's Senior Vice President "used confidential Scientology counseling sessions to bring a wedge between Tom and his wife Nicole because Nicole didn't want to do Scientology anymore." She added that leader David Miscavige, "through Marty Rathbun, got rid of Nicole to get Tom closer to Scientology." The couple eventually split in 2001, and when the divorce was finalized, Kidman went viral for leaving her lawyer's office in utter bliss.

Jump to 2006, and Cruise married Katie Holmes with Miscavige acting as his best man , but come 2012, the actress " blindsided " Cruise by filing for divorce and seeking sole custody of their daughter, Suri. While their split may not have been a direct outcome of meddling from Scientologists, like the fallout between him and Kidman, it appears that it was Scientology that pushed Holmes away. When Cruise was asked during a deposition (via People ) if Holmes had filed for divorce to "protect" Suri from Scientology, he conceded, "That was one of the assertions, yes."

The Church of Scientology allegedly auditioned wives for Tom Cruise

After Nicole Kidman and before Katie Holmes, the Church of Scientology tried to find the ideal wife for Tom Cruise. At least, that's the shocking story Vanity Fair reported on in 2012, alleging that Shelly Miscavige, wife of Scientology leader David Miscavige, was tasked with finding the ideal girlfriend for their star member.

It was 2004 when a reported audition process took place during which actresses (all Scientology members, of course) were called into what they believed to be an audition for a training film. They were reportedly asked questions like, "What do you think of Tom Cruise?" and, in October 2004, Homeland actress Nazanin Boniadi was chosen as a frontrunner. According to the magazine, Boniadi went through daily audits for a month and was forced to disclose everything about herself, including "every detail of her sex life."

Boniadi was eventually chosen to go on a date with Cruise in November 2004, but not before reportedly being told to remove her braces, darken her hair, and break up with her boyfriend. According to sources, she also had to sign a number of confidentiality agreements, but the romance fell apart in January 2005. Insiders claim that Cruise would report his girlfriend (who had moved in with him) to Scientology staff when he was displeased with her actions and, in the end, he got someone to break up with her, explaining that Cruise "wants someone with her own power — like Nicole."

Tom Cruise has been accused of 'brainwashing' his oldest children

While Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman were married, they adopted two children — Isabella and Connor — and when they split, Cruise did his best to convince them to cut their mother out of their lives. That's the shocking allegation that former Scientologist Sam Domingo made in 2019, telling R Online , "Tom made the decision to disconnect from Nicole and have his children disconnect." Claiming that Isabella and Connor "weren't given a choice about [Scientology] school or about disconnecting from their mother," she added that Cruise "brainwashed" them and that "in their eyes, Nicole is what Scientologists call a 'meat body.' She's not really their mother — she's just a bad person," she explained, noting that "those kids have grown up without choices. They're being used as leverage for the church and it's not right," she concluded.

Meanwhile, former Scientologist Katrina Reyes told R Online in 2018 that Connor was being groomed into the "perfect Scientologist" while living in a Church-owned hotel under constant surveillance. "They'll have him on course and doing some auditing, he can't go out and party and drink, and he'll be on vitamins and juices," Reyes claimed. As for Isabella, The Underground Bunker  uncovered in 2019 that she starred in a promotional video encouraging members to intern as auditors at the church's London branch. "I became that annoying girl in the org who would just talk endlessly about how incredible training is and how phenomenal the internship is," she gushed, adding, "Thank you to my Dad for everything."

He criticized Brooke Shield's battle with postpartum depression

In 2005, actress Brooke Shields used her memoir, Down Came the Rain: My Journey Through Postpartum Depression , to get real about her struggle with mental health, which followed the arrival of daughter Rowan in 2003. She was honest about using therapy and antidepressants to cope, and that sure seemed to bother Tom Cruise.

The actor told Access Hollywood (via People ) that Shield's glowing reviews of antidepressants were "irresponsible." He claimed that "when someone says [medication] has helped them, it is to cope, it didn't cure anything. There is no science. There is nothing that can cure them whatsoever," he continued before adding a back-handed compliment: "I care about Brooke Shields because I think she is an incredibly talented woman, [but] look at where her career has gone." Cruise also spoke out against Shields on Today , saying that "psychiatry is a pseudoscience" and that "all [medication] does is mask the problem." He added that "there is no such thing as a chemical imbalance in the body" and that vitamins and exercise are the cure.

Shields fired back in an op-ed for The New York Times , writing that "comments like those made by Tom Cruise are a disservice to mothers everywhere." She added, "If any good can come of Mr. Cruise's ridiculous rant, let's hope that it gives much-needed attention to a serious disease." Shields also told People that "Tom should stick to saving the world from aliens and let women who are experiencing postpartum depression decide what treatment options are best for them."

Did Tom Cruise abandon daughter Suri Cruise?

Tom Cruise doesn't want anyone to think he abandoned his youngest daughter, but that's exactly what numerous stories have claimed over the years. 

In 2012, Cruise went as far as to file a $50 million lawsuit against Bauer Media for articles that appeared in In Touch and Life & Style, claiming he had abandoned Suri . However, during a 2013 deposition, he was forced to admit (via People ) that he didn't see his daughter for over 100 days in 2012 due to work. Jump to 2016, and In Touch reported that the number had grown to over 1,000 days. A source told the mag that Cruise "uses his film commitments as an excuse, but the truth is that doesn't hold much weight with Suri anymore." They went on to cite Scientology's "disconnection" policy, which allegedly discourages members from having ties to former members, and explained, "He's disconnected from Katie, and then de facto from Suri, because of her connection to Katie. He hasn't seen her since she was 7."

Meanwhile, Leah Remini told the New York Post in 2020 that "Scientology considers Katie a suppressive person, which is an enemy, and therefore Tom believes, like all Scientologists, that he can't be connected to Suri." However, the actress added that she's "sure his master plan is to wait until Suri gets older so that he can lure her into Scientology and away from her mother." In 2019, In Touch reported that Cruise was reportedly ready to build a relationship with Suri.

He appeared to compare acting to fighting in Afghanistan

Did Tom Cruise really compare acting to fighting in a war? It was during a 2013 deposition in his $50 million lawsuit against Bauer Media that the actor apparently told a court (via TMZ ) that shooting on location is just as grueling as serving a tour of duty. The opposing lawyer is cited as telling Cruise that "your counsel has publicly equated your absence from Suri for these extended periods of time as being analogous to someone fighting in Afghanistan" and asking, "Are you aware of that?" The actor is quoted as responding that he "didn't hear the Afghanistan, but that's what it feels like, and certainly on this last movie, it was brutal. It was brutal."

The story immediately began making headlines, and Cruise's lawyer, Bert Fields, tried to set things right, saying his client's remarks were taken out of context. He noted that when Cruise was asked, "Do you believe the situations [being in a movie and fighting a war in Afghanistan] are the same?" as a follow-up question, he scoffed, "Oh come on." 

Fields also slammed (via People ) that "the assertions that Tom Cruise likened making a movie to being at war in Afghanistan is a gross distortion of the record. What Tom said, laughingly, was that sometimes, 'That's what it feels like,'" he added.

Blind Items Exposed

Join four sisters as we read gossip columns and guess who the subject of blind items may be.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

• Crazy Days and Nights

This B list film actor who has always done films is in the midst of quite the career comeback. However, on the set of his latest film he has reconnected with an old friend from the past. The old friend was his drug dealer who has always been known as the drug dealer to the stars. No, granted, being seen at dinner with the guy does not mean our actor is partaking again of drugs, but why is he even having dinner with him in the first place?

16 comments:

I think this is obviously Robert Downey Jr.

I thought RDj right away also, although is he a B list actor? I'd say he's more A. I then thought of Colin Farrell - is he filming now?

RDJ is most definitely considered an A lister. He is heavily in demand and at the top of his career right now. Colin F. is also A list for sure. This is so vague though! It is frustrating...I also don't much care:)

What about Owen - the blond guy? He's not really A list is he?

But does Owen need a career comeback? I would think he is more A list than B, also. While I don't care for him he works a lot, with a lot of big names.

Also, 'who has always done films', RDj did Ally McBeal (tv). What about Vince Vaughn, is he doing anything? I don't think Colin Farrell is A list. I think he's B list.

Colin is most definitely A list!! VV is a good guess for sure!! Maybe even Owen Wilson. But I am liking Vaughn more & more for this one though...good guess, anon 10:11!!.

Adam Sandler? 8 Crazy Nights, the title made me think of this.

I don't think its Colin Farrell, as back in Britain he's done TV and stage. In the US, its entirely possible to work completely in films so I think this is an American actor So, I think that this is an American actor, and possibly older than Farrell - say late 30's - 40's. It's the comeback hint that makes me think that, as I don't think Ted would count short breaks from projects as "comebacks". It'll be interesting to see who the AIAs are.

Oops! It's not a Ted BV - my bad!

anonymous - crazy days and nights is the title of the gossip blog that posted the blind item. There is no title for this blind item itself.

What about Mickey Rourke?

I agree with Mickey Rourke. Access Hollywood teased about his new movie "the wrestler" and referred to as it as his comeback.

I was thinking Joaquin Phoenix for this one...he's not A-list and his career has been quiet lately. Lainey also wrote recently about his drugged-out behavior at TIFF.

Joaquin is not A list?? What is with people insisiting actors of his & RDJ & Colin F. calibur are NOT A list? If you read Lainey on even a semi-regular basis, especially when she wrote about Phoenix's drugged out appearance at TIFF, you would know that he most definitely IS A list. As are RDJ & Colin. :)

Keanu Reeves

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The ball hair was next level

While at a recent event, this pint sized actor wore the worst hair piece he has ever worn.

It was next level.

Scientology Patrons Ball in UK

Tom Cruise dons black tie attire for Scientology at the ‘Patrons Ball’ in England.

The event featured the triumphant return of Scientology’s leader, David Miscavige, and the dramatic entrance of Cruise via helicopter.

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'Knight and Day': Behind the Scenes

Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz talk about how they pulled off that motorcycle chase

Staff Editor

In Knight and Day , Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz hop on a motorcycle for a climactic high-speed chase through the Spanish city of Cádiz. Some of the scene was shot with stunt doubles or with their chopper comfortably attached to a mobile camera rig, but Cruise often went freestyle with Diaz sitting behind him. He’s ridden motorbikes since he was a kid, so that wasn’t much of a problem — until the day they had to ride alongside a stampeding herd of bulls.

”They’re going to get food at the end of the run,” says Diaz, ”so the ones in back are trying to get to the front. There’s a lot of pushing and trying to move up on each other. But you can’t really be fearful, [because] then you’re putting yourself in danger. You have to be focused.”

The crew had shot with the bulls for four days before the stars arrived, but there were still a few risky moments. ”The stone road was very slick,” says Cruise. ”That’s why we chose that Ducati [motorcycle]. The tires were good. It was lighter in weight than the superbikes.”

The tricky part, says Diaz, came ”mostly in the throttling and braking. You know, keeping the right speed for the camera, but making sure that we were the right distance away from the bulls.” Laughs Cruise, ”The heart was definitely pumping that morning!”

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23 Unsettlingly Nice Tom Cruise Stories

This post originally ran after the release of The Mummy . Because Tom Cruise has continued to be a nice guy ( unless COVID-19 protocols are being broken ), we have continued to update this post to include more unsettlingly nice stories.

First things first: We get it. There’s an awful lot of unsettling Scientology stuff ( a whole lot of stuff ) around Tom Cruise. But pay no attention to that: Cruise has a new movie out , which means it’s time for the latest round of absolutely gushing stories about Tom Cruise. They’re kind of like Prince stories — always unique and surprising, often exceedingly delightful, if you can ignore the odd feeling in the back of your spine. On a Hollywood press tour, it’s a truth universally acknowledged that Tom Cruise is a super-nice dude.

He taught Zac Efron how to ride a motorcycle. In 2010, a young Zac Efron sat down with the now-defunct Details magazine for a cover shoot. He was in his post– High School Musical phase, trying to break out of the teen-star shell. Somewhere along the line, Tom Cruise asked him if he knew how to ride a motorcycle. “You wanna learn how?” Cruise asked , inviting young Efron to his house. According to Details , Cruise “taught him how a motorcycle engine works, showed him the hangar with his dozens of pristine bikes — including the Triumphs he rode in the Mission: Impossible movies.” When Details asked him why he thought Tom Cruise would do such a nice thing, he had no idea. “I don’t know. I don’t even want to know,” he said. “It’s just so cool that he gave a shit, the fact that he cared at all. No one else did that.”

He helped Mummy co-star Jake Johnson get in shape. “Here’s a story that is very anti-Hollywood, but very Tom,” Johnson told Thrillist recently . “He wanted me to work out with him and get in shape for the movie. People have told me in the past, including New Girl , that I need to lose weight and stay in shape. But they don’t tell me how. It’s like, ‘Hey tubbo, fit into these slacks!’” Instead Tom Cruise invited Johnson to his gym (the “ Pain Cave ”). “He said, ‘You’ll be training with me and my trainers. If you want I’ll put you on a food plan with my chef. The food is great,’” Johnson recalled. When someone on Mummy set insisted that Johnson wait until after Cruise was done working out so the star could have the gym alone, Cruise was furious. “Let me make something crystal clear: I don’t care what anybody on the crew says to you, they don’t know what I’m saying to you,” Johnson remembered him saying. “And I’m saying to you that you are always welcome. I don’t care what I’m doing in there. You’re not other. You’re my castmate. Come in.”

He stayed in touch with the kid who dropped out of Jerry Maguire . Before Jonathan Lipnicki, there was another kid set to steal the show on the Jerry Maguire set. He spent a few weeks filming, but after a certain point, he “ran out of gas,” Cameron Crowe told Deadline , and wanted to leave the production. The role was recast — Lipnicki stepped in — but Crowe got a call from the mother of the boy who almost took the role. “Weeks later, the mother of the first kid calls the office. I got on the phone and she says, ‘Will you please tell Tom Cruise thank you for the way he has kept in touch with my son, sent him letters and gifts, and just let him know all is well?’ I thought, wow, I had no idea Tom Cruise was doing that,” he said. Crowe continued:

“She said, ‘It really helped my son. He’s over it now, he’s fine, and Tom did a beautiful job helping him transition back to his life.’ I went to Tom, later, and said, you quietly helped this kid through what could have been a terrible transition. Thank you, but why did you never tell any of us? Tom said, ‘I just didn’t want that first actor to go to the movies, look at the screen and think he’d failed. I wanted him to love movies, his entire life.’ That is the quiet way Tom Cruise conducts his professional life.”

He gave Kanye West advice on his fledgling comedy career, but declined a role in Kanye’s HBO pilot. Once upon a time, Kanye made a comedy pilot for HBO. When Vulture saw the pilot , Wyatt Cenac revealed overhearing a conversation between Kanye and Cruise: “Kanye had been trying to get Tom Cruise to be in the pilot. And he had asked him because they were friendly. And we’re shooting a scene [in the Escalade] and at one point Kanye’s like, ‘Shut the fuck up, it’s Tom Cruise,’ and because he couldn’t get out of the car, he had to take the phone call smashed between people,” Cenac said. “You can hear Tom Cruise laughing [ does a Tom Cruise laugh ] as Kanye goes, ‘Yeah, man, I’ve been working on the improv stuff, you know, all your suggestions were great.’ [ Does another Tom Cruise laugh. ] That went on for like 15 minutes. Tom Cruise never did the show and we had to hire a Tom Cruise look-alike that was like five-feet taller than Cruise.”

He’s a good sport on set. “I think there’s something very right with him in that he cares so much about the audience experience,” his Mission: Impossible co-star Simon Pegg told Jimmy Fallon. “It’s like he’s obsessive with giving people an authentic experience.” Actor-director Todd Field, who acted with Cruise in Eyes Wide Shut , said something similar of working with Cruise and Stanley Kubrick: “You’ve never seen [an actor] more completely subservient and prostrate themselves at the feet of a director.”

He convinced the Black Eyed Peas to do a song for Knight and Day. Tom Cruise, a self-described “big fan of the Peas,” was almost done with filming Knight and Day when he, co-star Cameron Diaz, and ex-wife Katie Holmes saw them play over Super Bowl weekend. He was struck with a brilliant idea : “As we were watching, it occurred to me that this is the perfect time, so I called up Will [i.am], and he doesn’t have any time, but I asked, ‘Are you interested [in doing a song for the film]?’” They were, so they did.

He totally did not get mad at Cuba Gooding Jr.’s dad when he asked about his sexuality. During the filming of Jerry Maguire , Cuba Gooding Sr. impolitely inquired about Tom Cruise’s sexuality. “He gave Tom Cruise a hug and said, ‘I love you, man. Now seriously, are you gay or not?’” Gooding Jr. recalled , years later. “I almost fainted. And thought, Please, lord, let me disappear .” Cruise was so chill dealing with the prying parent: “Tom just laughed and said ‘No,’” his co-star reported.

He gave Kevin Pollock a $500 pen (and then a second pen). During rehearsals for A Few Good Men , Kevin Pollock noticed Tom Cruise making notes in his script with a ridiculously huge pen. At first, they joked about it. Then, Cruise convinced Pollock to try writing with it. “It’s like an angel wing floating on a cloud. It was a magical pen,” Pollock recalled to the Chive . Even Demi Moore agreed the pen was a total joy to use. When Pollock learned the pen cost $500, he was crestfallen. Later, Cruise’s assistant showed up with a gift: the luxury writing utensil itself. When Pollock admitted to his co-star that he hadn’t used the pen because he felt it deserved a special spot on his mantle, Cruise bought him a second $500 pen — one for the mantle, and one for Pollock’s pocket.

He personally arranged for Bill Hader to leave a set and get home to New York after an attempted bombing in Times Square. As Bill Hader and Tom Cruise were in Los Angeles filming promos for the 2010 MTV Movie Awards, word reached the set that a car bomb had just gone off in Times Square. Hader was a new dad at the time, concerned about his wife and infant daughter in New York. Cruise noticed Hader’s concern, and asked when he’d get to go home to check on them. Hader wasn’t due back to the city for two more days, and so, Tom Cruise took over the set and got Bill Hader home by 8 a.m. the next morning. As Hader recalled:

“He thinks for a second. ‘No,’ he says. ‘We’ll get you home tonight.’ And in that moment, Tom Cruise, as Les Grossman, in a karate gi, began to direct all my coverage,” Hader recalled. “All my footage, all my close-ups. Boom! We do three perfect takes. Boom, boom, boom. Everyone’s chest-butting each other, some people are chest-butting themselves, people are going insane.” Two days’ worth of work, Hader said, “and he got it done in 45 minutes.” Then Katie Holmes came up to him and handed him a piece of paper with his new flight information. “You’re on the red eye tonight,” she told him. “I’m like, ‘What?!’” Hader said. Because Cruise got him out of work and on a plane that night, he was able to surprise his wife and daughter by 7:45 the next morning and check in on them in person. “So that’s what it’s like to work with Tom Cruise,” Hader said.

He rescued a family from their burning sailboat. While vacationing with then-wife Nicole Kidman and their kids on their luxury yacht in 1997, Tom Cruise spotted a sailboat going up in flames. The actor sent the yacht’s skiff to rescue the people aboard — French “paper tycoon” Jacques Lejeune, 68, his wife, Bernadette, 42, daughter Eugénie, 7, and two crew members — according to People .

He helped rescue a victim of a hit-and-run, and paid her medical bills. The year before the sailboat rescue, Tom Cruise was driving down Wilshire Boulevard on a rainy night when he watched Heloisa Vinhas, a 23-year-old aspiring actress, get hit by a car. Cruise commanded someone to call for help and accompanied her to UCLA Medical Center, according to People . He even picked up the $7,000 medical bill for her broken left leg and bruised ribs when he found out she wasn’t insured. “If he’s not Superman, he can be Batman — Batman doesn’t have superpowers,” Vinhas told the mag.

He saved a pair of his littlest fans during a crowded red carpet. At Mission: Impossible ’s West End premiere, Tom Cruise spotted preteen fans Laurence Sadler, 7, and Christos “Chris” Tzanetis, 13. As he and Kidman made their way through the crowd, he eyed Sadler being pinned against a steel bar. Cruise rescued both young fans from being crushed, and called for a police officer’s help. “Every night I say good-night to him when I pass his poster in my room,” Sadler told People at the time.

He never forgets Dakota Fanning’s birthday. “He has sent me a birthday gift every year since I was 11 years old,” Fanning told Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live . “I always think, Oh, when I’m 18, he’ll probably stop. Oh, 21, he’ll stop. But every year. It’s really kind.” Fanning says he usually gifts her shoes.

He bought his publicist’s daughter so many wedding gifts. Pat Kingsley and Tom Cruise had one of the closest talent-publicist relationships. They met after he’d finished work on A Few Good Men , and often talked every day. They parted ways, she later said, over a disagreement over The Last Samauri ’s press tour: He wanted to talk more openly about Scientology; she thought it wasn’t a good talking point during the press tour. But before that, she said, “We talked constantly,” telling The Hollywood Reporter that they shared 11 p.m. calls almost nightly. “He was an insomniac. I liked the fact that he was so much fun. And he was so thoughtful. He remembered birthdays, my daughter’s birthday. He came to her wedding; she was registered somewhere for the china, and he bought out everything. They’ve got things they haven’t even opened yet, and they’ve been together 15 years!”

He sends Kirsten Dunst (and Jimmy Kimmel) a cake every year. Kirsten Dunst acted with Cruise in 1994’s Interview With a Vampire . “I ran into Tom like five years ago, and now I get this cake every that’s one of the best cakes I’ve ever had. It’s from Dylan’s Bakery in Thousand Oaks,” she explained to Jimmy Kimmel in 2015. “We call it the ‘Cruise cake’ at my family’s house. We’re like, ‘Cruise cake’s here!’ And it’s gone within a day.” Kimmel agrees that the cake is good, and that he receives one regularly, too.

He gifted his lawyer a rare book of English history. When Cruise’s longtime lawyer Bert Fields turned 86, the actor got him an especially thoughtful gift. Fields received a customized Cruise cake and “an extremely rare edition of [Raphael] Holinshed’s history of England,” Fields told THR . “He knows I write about English history, and this is a fantastic prize.”

He’s maintained a friendship with Billy Wilder in the director’s last years. Cameron Crowe really wanted the legendary director to take the role of Jerry’s mentor, Dicky Fox. Crowe was inspired by The Apartment , and set a meeting with Wilder to offer him the role. When he arrived to Wilder’s office, the director started chatting about his old movies, mistaking him for a messenger. When Crowe offered him the role, he declined, finally saying yes after a long courtship.

When filming began, Wilder apologized and dropped out. Crowe told Cruise. “Cruise says, let’s go talk him into it. We drive to Billy Wilder’s office. Billy is there, and he lights up when he sees that it’s Tom Cruise. He invites us in,” Crowe recalled to Deadline . “He tells Tom these stories about Cary Grant, and Sunset Boulevard . He’s just magnificent. And I realize he is in full Hollywood director, getting-ready-to-make-another-picture-as-soon-as-possible mode, and he’s got Tom Cruise in his office. And I’m virtually invisible at this point, as that romance is happening.” Eventually, Wilder finally declined and the role was recast. Crowe told Deadline Wilder and Cruise remained friends until the director’s death. “He loved Billy Wilder and we talked about him, constantly. Tom wrote notes to Billy, and they developed a little bit of a friendship. When Billy passed away, Tom came to the memorial and really let everybody know how much he loved Billy. I think Tom got a big kick out of Wilder. How could you not?”

He got Cameron Crowe back into directing. After the failure of Elizabethtown , Cameron Crowe wasn’t sure about directing another movie. Then Tom Cruise took him for a drive, and the two of them ended up on the set of Knocked Up . “Mr. Cruise introduced Mr. Crowe to Mr. Apatow, who joked that he’d been stealing for years from Say Anything , the sharp-witted teen comedy that first established Mr. Crowe as a director in 1989,” the New York Times reported. “Cruise sidles up to me and goes: ‘See? Get out of your house, man, it’s fun,’” Crowe recalled to the Times . “And that’s when it felt like, yeah, it’s time to direct again.”

He released Jessica Chastain from her Oblivion contract so she could star in Zero Dark Thirty. Jessica Chastain was set to co-star with Tom Cruise in the dystopian action movie Oblivion when she got a call from Kathryn Bigelow, who wanted Chastain for Zero Dark Thirty . Before even reading the script, Chastain told The Hollywood Reporter in 2017, she agreed to star. Cruise came to Chastain’s rescue: “I was excited to do [ Oblivion ]. But when [ Zero Dark Thirty ] came my way, I realized I had to do this. And the person who made it possible for me to do this movie is Tom Cruise. Someone contacted him from my agency and said, ‘Listen, she wants to work with you. And she would love to, but there is this other film, and it’s so important.’ And he said, ‘OK, we’re going to let you out of your contract.’” Olga Kurylenko eventually signed on to Oblivion in Chastain’s place.

He always takes his kids calls, even in the middle of a scene. “There were times that I was about ready to say ‘Action; and the phone rang,” Steven Spielberg told People in 2002 about working with Tom Cruise in Minority Report . “If it was Tom’s kids, everything stopped for that. Just when he was preparing for probably the hardest scene he has in the whole movie, the phone rang. Anybody else would have looked up with anger in their eyes, but he immediately broke character and walked off and took the call.” Spielberg was impressed by his star’s attention to his kids even when it came to minor emergencies: “Connor or Isabella had stuck an eraser in their eye or something like that. It was not serious, but Dad came to the rescue. I thought it was amazing. I have been known to say, ‘I’ll call them back after the shot.’”

He bought W. Earl Brown Elton John–Billy Joel tickets after a rehearsal ran late. While shooting Vanilla Sky , a rehearsal ran late and Cruise’s scene partner W. Earl Brown ( Deadwood , Preacher ) missed an Elton John–Billy Joel concert he had tickets to in L.A. Once Tom Cruise found out, according to People , he made it up to Brown: “You didn’t give your tickets away? Why didn’t somebody tell me?” he reportedly asked. When Elton John and Billy Joel played in L.A. a few nights later, Cruise got Brown two tickets to the show, fourth-row center.

He danced to Yung Joc on BET. Technically, this isn’t a nice thing Tom Cruise did for any one person in particular, but rather one very nice thing he did for the internet as a whole. For a short period of time, the Yung Joc motorcycle dance was the most important dance you could do. And Cruise, in an appearance on BET, did the dance. He sold it, committed completely. So here you have it: Tom Cruise dancing on 106 & Park during Mission: Impossible III ’s press tour.

He helped Jennifer Connelly face her fear of flying. Turns out Tom Cruise can help someone without even knowing he’s doing it. Jennifer Connelly told Graham Norton that she suffered from a “really crippling fear of flying” for years before she filmed Top Gun: Maverick. She didn’t realize her character had a scene in the air. But even though he was unaware of her phobia, Cruise gave her a reassuring heads-up from the cockpit: “He’s like, ‘It’s going to be very graceful, very elegant, just some very elegant rolls, you know. It’s going to be nice and easy.’”

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What People Who Know Tom Cruise Had To Say About Him

Tom Cruise has been one of the biggest movie stars in the world for decades. From his star-making role in 1983's Risky Business to later films like 2018's Mission: Impossible - Fallout and 2022's Top Gun: Maverick , the actor has worked with hundreds, if not thousands, of producers, directors, writers, co-stars, and crew members. 

And, as has been the case with other famous actors , many people have told their stories about what it was like to work and/or just hang out with Cruise. Perhaps not surprisingly given the length of his career, some people have had very positive experiences dealing with the actor, while others have not.

Below are just some of those stories about dealing with Tom Cruise on and off the set.

Cruise Got Bill Hader Out To New York So He Could Check On His Family After A Bombing Attempt In Times Square

Tom Cruise and Bill Hader worked together on the 2008 action-comedy  Tropic Thunder . The two actors were in Los Angeles to reprise their  Tropic Thunder  characters in promos for the 2010 MTV Movie Awards when Hader learned some frightening news that made him desperate to get back to his family in New York. 

In a 2012 interview with Vulture, Hader remembered :

I hear a crew person say, “Did you hear what happened in New York?” And I’m like, “What happened?” “A guy tried to set off a car bomb in Times Square.”

A panicked Hader, who was a new dad, desperately tried to get a hold of his wife back in New York. When Cruise noticed Hader's reaction and asked what was the matter, Hader explained how he was trying to find out if his family was okay. Cruise then learned that the other actor wasn't due to go back to New York for two more days:

[Tom] thinks for a second. “No. We’ll get you home tonight.” And in that moment, Tom Cruise, [as his Tropic Thunder character Les Grossman], in a karate gi, began to direct all my coverage [for the MTV promos]. All my footage, all my close-ups. Boom! We do three perfect takes. Boom, boom, boom. Everyone’s chest-butting each other, some people are chest-butting themselves, people are going insane. 

Once the promos were filmed, Cruise's then-wife Katie Holmes handed Hader a piece of paper with his new flight information, telling him he was on a red-eye flight to New York that night.

The SNL comedian and actor explained to Vulture that because of Cruise's quick action, he was back home with his wife and baby daughter early the next day. He told the interviewer, “So that’s what it’s like to work with Tom Cruise.”

Cruise Kept In Touch With A Young Actor Who Dropped Out Of 'Jerry Maguire'

In the 1996 film Jerry Maguire , Jonathan Lipnicki portrayed Ray, the young son of Renée Zellweger's character. But as Cameron Crowe, the film's writer/director, explained in an interview with Deadline, a different young actor was the first choice for the role:

We saw a lot of people, and I fell in love with a young actor from Seattle who reminded me of some real kids I’d known. My one thing I told [casting director] Gail Levin was, we can’t have a McDonald’s commercial kid in this part. I need a real kid who is suffering without a father, who sometimes is not the happiest kid in the world. We hired this young actor, spent two or three weeks filming with him. Late one night, we were doing a two-shot where Tom comes over drunk to Renée’s apartment, and he confides in the kid. And the kid just kind of ran out of gas and announced to the room, “I don’t want to do this.” There was such simple conviction in the way this young man said he didn’t want to do this that we knew we had to replace him. That he was not born for the silver screen, at all. Tom understood it and was great about it.

So they went back to auditioning kids for the part and ending up casting Lipnicki. A few weeks later, Crowe received a phone call from the mother of the young actor who had decided against being in the film:

I got on the phone and she says, “Will you please tell Tom Cruise thank you for the way he has kept in touch with my son, sent him letters and gifts, and just let him know all is well?” I thought, “Wow, I had no idea Tom Cruise was doing that.” She said, “It really helped my son. He’s over it now, he’s fine, and Tom did a beautiful job helping him transition back to his life.”  I went to Tom, later, and said, “You quietly helped this kid through what could have been a terrible transition. Thank you, but why did you never tell any of us?” Tom said, “I just didn’t want that first actor to go to the movies, look at the screen and think he’d failed. I wanted him to love movies his entire life.” That is the quiet way Tom Cruise conducts his professional life.

Cruise Whipped Jake Johnson Into Shape For His Role In 'The Mummy'

Jake Johnson appeared alongside Tom Cruise in the 2017 film The Mummy . The New Girl  star portrayed Chris Vail, a US army corporal, while Cruise played his friend and former Army sergeant Nick Morton. Johnson, who had little experience working on an action film prior to  The Mummy , told Thrillist that while he was flattered that the role had been written with him in mind, he had his doubts about working with Cruise:

I panicked! I know his [reputation]. He does his own stunts. I read the first act [of the movie] and it’s like, ”Nick and Vail jump off a three-story building as it explodes, they feel the heat on their backs." And when you read those little things somebody has to actually do that. That meant the fire would be touching us! That meant I was jumping through fire and I was like, “I don’t want to jump through fire!”

But he flew to London to meet with Cruise, who talked Johnson into taking the role. The movie star ended up working with Johnson to get the younger actor in shape for the production:

Tom said, “I really want you fit for this movie.” I literally thought I was going to have to call [ New Girl actor] Max Greenfield to do CrossFit. But Tom said, “You’ll be training with me and my trainers. If you want I’ll put you on a food plan with my chef. The food is great…” He [also] said I could use his gym whenever I wanted.  One day I got to work to work out and one of the [assistant directors] goes, “You can’t go in right now because Tom is working out.” I thought, “That sucks, I got here an hour early to get this in, but he’s Tom Cruise.” After, when we were shooting later that day, he said, “What happened to you? I thought you said you were going to work out this morning?” I told him I was told not to bother him and he got really pissed. He said, “Let me make something crystal clear: I don’t care what anybody on the crew says to you, they don’t know what I’m saying to you. And I’m saying to you that you are always welcome. I don’t care what I’m doing in there. You’re not other. You’re my castmate. Come in.” 

Cruise Gifted Kevin Pollak $1,000 Worth Of Pens

Kevin Pollak worked with Tom Cruise on the 1992 film A Few Good Men , portraying Lt. Sam Weinberg, an Army lawyer. During a 2015 appearance on theCHIVE podcast, Pollak told a story about how Cruise gifted him a very expensive item just a handful of days after meeting him:

I show up for rehearsal for A Few Good Men and I’m freaking out. You know, there's Tom Cruise, there's Demi Moore, the three of us are going to rehearse our scenes. But the moment I arrive, giant movie star Tom Cruise treats me like an equal.  So I see him making a note in his script, and he's using this pen. This is not a Mont Blanc - this is like Mont Blanc on steroids. It's a ridiculous giant - the kind of pen you want a movie star to use. So I go up to him and say, “Hey, Tom, they don’t make a bigger pen? Really? I bet we could find one. C'mon.”  And he laughs, y'know. So I'm busting his balls the whole f***ing day about this pen. Every chance I get, I'm giving giant movie star Tom Cruise s**t about his stupid pen. At the end of the day he goes, “Yeah yeah. Yeah. Funny. Write with it.” And he hands it to me. And I grab it out of his hand and go, “What’s the big f***ing deal, Tom? It's a pen.” And I start writing with it and I go, “Oh s**t.” It's like an angel wing floating on a cloud. It was a magical pen. The suspension system and the ballpoint and whatever… It was an insane f***ing pen.

Pollack added that when Moore saw Pollak's reaction, she became interested in finding out more about the pen: 

[We found out that] this pen is available in one store in the United States. It was made in Paris, France, and it was available at Barney's in New York. And the pen cost $500. To me, that's the exact number that tells me that I will never own this f****ing pen… So 10 days or so later we're shooting the film… [There's a] knock on the door… open it up, there's Tom's assistant. He hands me a wrapped gift. I open it up, it's one of these f***ing pens. And it's in this teak triangle, rectangle box. Crazy. And I go to Tom's trailer and I go, “What the f***?!” And he goes, “you love the pen, right?” And I say, “Yeah, but Tom, I’ve known you like 10 days. You should talk to somebody, this isn't right.” He goes, “No, no, you love the pen.”

Later that day, Pollak was making a note in his script - with a different pen - when Cruise spotted him:

He goes, “Kev, where’s the pen?” I say, “Oh, Tom. I can’t use the pen. No, the pen goes on the mantle in my house. People come over to my house and I point to the pen with my hand, I gesture to it and I tell people the story about the pen. It'll be the greatest f***ing pen story they'll ever f***ing hear. Tom, I use the pen… I might lose the pen, and that can never f***ing happen!”  He laughs, he's gets it, but then I notice he's sort of crestfallen. So I swear to you, six days later I'm sitting on my *ss in the trailer. Knock on the trailer door, I open it up, there's Tom's assistant. Hands me this wrapped gift and says, “Tom wants you to use the other pen.” That's not multimillionaire movie star Tom Cruise showing off. That was his way of saying, “I get it. You’ve made your point. Now use this f***ing pen!”

Kirsten Dunst Shared The Advice Cruise Gave Her While Auditioning For 'Interview with the Vampire' Audition

Kirsten Dunst was just 11 years old when she auditioned for the role that would be her first big break - Claudia in  Interview with the Vampire . 

In an episode of Netflix's show  The Playback , Dunst talked about how the audition process for the film included having to do a scene with Tom Cruise:

I remember I was the tallest of all the young girls [who were auditioning]. [Tom] had to pick each one of us up and carry us around. Just to see how we looked against Tom, and who looked the most childlike I guess. And I remember Tom whispering to me, “Tuck your legs under” so I looked as tiny as possible because I was the tallest girl... So I knew he was kind of rooting for me, and we were both from New Jersey. And I think he was like “let this Jersey girl have it.”

Steven Spielberg Said Cruise Always Took Calls From His Kids While On Set

Steven Spielberg has directed Tom Cruise in two feature films -  Minority Report (2002) and  War of the Worlds  (2005). Both films received generally favorable reviews and were huge box-office hits.

In addition to being a huge movie star, Cruise is a father. And as Spielberg told   People  magazine, while filming  Minority Report , the actor often prioritized his kids over his work:

There were times that I was about ready to say “Action,” and the phone rang. If it was Tom’s kids, everything stopped for that. Just when he was preparing for probably the hardest scene he has in the whole movie, the phone rang. Anybody else would have looked up with anger in their eyes, but he immediately broke character and walked off and took the call... Connor or Isabella had stuck an eraser in their eye or something like that. It was not serious, but Dad came to the rescue. I thought it was amazing. I have been known to say [when talking about his own kids], “I’ll call them back after the shot.” 

Angela Bassett And James Corden Said Cruise Sent Them Cakes

Tom Cruise has a major sweet tooth. But as he explained during a 2018 appearance on  The Late Late Show with James Corden with his Mission: Impossible - Fallout  co-star Angela Bassett, sugar is a no-no in his training routine when he's preparing for a film.

So instead of eating sweets himself, he sends the crew members and other actors desserts and lives vicariously through them: "I wait for the calls," Cruise told the talk show host. "Like, tell me about it [how the desserts tasted]."

Bassett admitted that she was more than happy to eat the cake that Cruise sent her. On a separate appearance on LIVE with Kelly and Ryan,  the actress spoke about how well Cruise treated her on set:

As soon as you show up to the set, he looks at you… He lights up for you and gives you the biggest, warmest embrace. He makes sure that you're taken care of, everything that you need. If it's cold - and it was frigid - he makes sure that you're warm. They blow two heaters at you… two heaters. Bring those heaters in! Blow that heat on her!… He's not playing. “Get that woman some comfort!”

Cruise also sent Corden a chocolate cake on the day of the 2018 Grammys (which Corden hosted) to wish him luck. As he recalled this incident during Cruise and Bassett's appearance, Corden jokingly told Cruise:

This is how you look so good. You make everyone around you fat.

Val Kilmer Said He And Cruise Hail From Galaxies 'Far, Far Away' From Each Other

Val Kilmer portrayed Lt. Tom "Iceman" Kazansky, the main rival turned wingman to Tom Cruise's Lt. Pete "Maverick" Mitchell in the 1988 film  Top Gun . Although Kilmer originally did not want to be in the film, it turned out to be one of the more memorable roles of his career.

In his memoir,  I’m Your Huckleberry ,  Kilmer wrote about how he and Cruise were very different in terms of personality, and how the cast originally split into two groups - Kilmer and the "party boys" and Cruise and his group. As Kilmer recalled:

Tom refrained from our revelry, with good reason. From day one, he was laser-focused on a singular goal: to become the greatest action hero in the history of film. He was up nights learning lines; he spent every waking hour perfecting his stunts. His dedication was admirable. Of course even more admirable is the fact that he achieved his goal… Tom is a comrade I respect and admire, though as creatures we hail from galaxies far, far away from one another.

To try and become friendlier with his co-star, Kilmer decided to play a prank on Cruise:

I gave him an extremely expensive bottle of champagne but placed it in the middle of a giant field and made him follow scavenger-hunt-style clues to find it. I hid behind a bleacher and watched him lug the giant crate to his motorcycle. He never did thank me for the Iceman-style bit. I thought it would break the ice, but I guess the ice was just right.

In the documentary  Val , the Juilliard-trained Kilmer admitted that he did bring some of his method acting training to the  Top Gun  set, deliberately trying to play up the rivalry  between his and Cruise's characters both on and off set. But he denied that he and Cruise weren't friendly. Kilmer was cast in the 2022 sequel Top Gun: Maverick  after reaching out to producer/star Cruise.

Kevin Bacon And Kyra Sedgwick Recalled Why They Won't Be Invited To Another Tom Cruise Party

Both Kyra Sedgwick ( Born on the Fourth of July ) and Kevin Bacon ( A Few Good Men ) have co-starred with Tom Cruise in films. The actors must have gotten along well enough with Cruise during the filming of those projects, as the married couple was invited to the star's house for dinner and a screening of  A Few Good Men .

As Sedgwick recalled during a 2021 appearance on  The Drew Barrymore Show , her curiosity led to police interrupting the party:

I was pregnant, I was very pregnant, and we got invited over to dinner. We got invited over for dinner with lots of famous people like Demi Moore and Bruce Willis, because she was in [ A Few Good Men ]... It was one of those nights that I often don't get invited to... There was this, like, fireplace mantle, and I was looking around and there was this little button underneath the mantel. I was like, “Oh what is that little button?” So I pressed the little button because I thought maybe something interesting will happen. Nothing happened and then I got a little nervous...  [When she told Cruise what she had done], He goes, “That's the panic button,” And so the cops came, they had to stop the screening, they had to see Tom. I think there were more than like five cop cars, it was something...

The actor laughingly admitted that she has never been invited back to Cruise's home.

Meanwhile, during his own appearance on  The Drew Barrymore Show , Bacon said he had talked to Cruise about Sedgwick's behavior at the party:

I just apologized. “Oh honey, she’s so crazy. There she goes again pressing buttons.”

Annabelle Wallis Had The Unique Privilege Of Running On-Screen With Cruise

Annabelle Wallis and Tom Cruise worked together on the 2017 film  The Mummy . There were a lot of action scenes in the film, but as the actor explained in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, she had to convince her reluctant co-star to let her be in some of these scenes with him: 

I got to run on-screen with him, but he told me no at first. He said, “Nobody runs on-screen [with me],” and I said, “But I’m a really good runner.” So, I would time my treadmill so that he’d walk in and see me run. And then he added all these running scenes. So, that was it. It was, like, better than an Oscar. I was so happy! I was so happy that I got to run on-screen with Tom Cruise.

Rob Lowe Said Cruise Went 'Ballistic' After Having To Share A Room While Filming 'The Outsiders'

Rob Lowe and Tom Cruise were both relatively unknown actors when they were brought to New York to audition for roles in the 1983 coming-of-age film  The Outsiders . But as Lowe laughingly recalled during an appearance on Dax Shepard's Armchair Expert podcast, Cruise already had a sense of entitlement:

[It was the] first time I ever stayed at the Plaza Hotel, and we check in and Tom finds out that we’re sharing a room and just goes ballistic... To me, what’s great about the story is, there’s certain people who have always been who they are, and that element of them has powered them to where they are today and the rest is history. And the notion that an 18-year-old actor with a walk-on part in Endless Love  and, like, a seventh lead in Taps could have that kind of like wherewithal. I remember going, “Wow, this guy is the real deal.” I mean it made me laugh - it was gnarly. But in the end of it, you can't argue with the results. He’s had his eye on the ball since day one.

Interestingly, during an appearance on The Kelly Clarkson Show , Lowe revealed  that was not the only time he and Cruise had to share accommodations: 

What happened was, when we were doing The Outsiders,  we’re 18 and 19 years old. It’s Francis Ford Coppola, the director who directed The Godfather  and Apocalypse Now  ... and in his effort to make us more authentic as greasers, as sort of tough Tulsa, sort of wrong side of the tracks guys, [he] found a bunch of different actual greasers who were now grown-up adults and made us go spend the night and live with them… They came to us at rehearsal and like, “OK, so, we’re gonna divide you up. Rob, Tom, you guys are gonna go stay with Bill and Sandy whoever.” And we just went to their little house and had dinner. Tom and I ended up in the basement in two cots and we’re like, “We don’t know these people…” I mean, who vetted them? Really? Do you think Francis Ford Coppola spent a lot of time vetting these people? I can tell you, he didn’t. He was with an espresso and watching some fancy Fellini movie and went, “Yeah, yeah that sounds great” and went back to his espresso.

The close quarters seemed to get to Cruise and Lowe, as he recalled a fight breaking out when he accidentally hit Cruise for real while rehearsing a scene. Lowe recalled :

We all beat the living s**t out of one another, we really did… I got one clean shot on Tom, and Tom is such a competitive lunatic - which is what I love about him - but the next thing you know he’s ready to kill me… We were all competitive. It wasn’t just Tom. We were hardcore.

Long Before They Worked Together On 'Collateral,' Jamie Foxx Flubbed An Audition With Cruise For 'Jerry Maguire'

Jamie Foxx and Tom Cruise co-starred in the 2004 action-thriller  Collateral ; Foxx portrayed a taxi driver who was forced to drive a hitman (Cruise) around Los Angeles so the latter could hunt down his intended targets.

Years before teaming up with Cruise for this film, Foxx had auditioned for the role of Rod Tidwell in  Jerry Maguire, which Cuba Gooding Jr. ended up playing. After an initial audition in Los Angeles, Foxx went to New York to read for Cruise, who hadn't signed on to star in the film yet. But as he explained during an interview on The Howard Stern Show , that audition didn't go well:

 So I get to New York and I was just like, c'mon man. Tom Cruise walked in with the little leather jacket... He looked like he'd just walked off of Top Gun . I was just done... I had no business being there, I felt. I remember making a fool of myself speaking to Tom. Tom said, “Where do you live?” And I said, “Oh I got two houses, I live in L.A. and Vegas.” I'm going toe-to-toe with Tom Cruise… So I said, “Where do you live?” He said, "Rome." And I said, “Rome Street?” And he looked at me and was like, “No, mother******, Italy.”

Foxx added that things didn't get any better once they started the audition:

I blew it 'cause I kept looking at him. Imagine you're from Texas, and you've done a little bit of s**t but you've never seen no real f***ing stars... So as I'm reading, you know, he does a dramatic pause, you know. But that's his thing. I f***ing think he lost his place, so I take the script and say, “No, we right here. ‘Show me the money…’” He says, “I know. I was taking a pause.” I said, “Ok, yeah, I'm f***ing this up.” But I blew it so bad, he just started laughing at me...

And Foxx said things got even worse as the audition continued:

And then at one point he did his lines like [starts whispering], he would have that little whisper thing. ...So I couldn't hear where he was and I said, “Could you...? You know I can't really hear you.” And he looked at me… like, “Hey, guy, you got to get it together.” So I'm blowing it, and the guy [the producer] pulls me out of the thing, and he goes, “What in the f*** are you doing?! You've got to f*** him up! He's Tom Cruise! You've got to take it to him!” And I felt like I just threw an interception in the big Texas game…

Leah Remini Wasn't Down For Cruise's Game Of Hide-And-Seek

Tom Cruise is a well-known Scientologist. Leah Remini also used to be a member, but - depending on who tells the story - either left or was expelled from the church. In her memoir Troublemaker: Surviving Hollywood and Scientology , the  King of Queens  actress wrote about going to a party at Cruise's home where he reportedly wanted to play hide-and-seek on his secluded 3-acre property with her and other party guests. The actress told her husband (Angelo Pagan):

Uh, Angelo, you’re going to go ahead and do this, because I’m not doing it. I’m not trying to play a f***ing game of hide-and-seek in five-inch stilettos.

Remini claimed that when she told Cruise that she wouldn't take part in the game because she was wearing Jimmy Choos (expensive high heels), the movie star allegedly replied, "Well, good. So you're 'it,' then."

It's unclear whether Remini was able to get out of playing, but she did say that people “didn’t just say no to ‘Mr. Cruise’ even when it came to little things.”

Thandiwe Newton Said Cruise Manifested A Zit In Just One Day

Thandiwe Newton and Tom Cruise co-starred in the 2000 film  Mission: Impossible II. In a 2020 interview with Vulture, Newton revealed that she was somewhat perturbed by Cruise's behavior on set:

I was so scared of Tom. He was a very dominant individual. He tries super hard to be a nice person. But the pressure. He takes on a lot. And I think he has this sense that only he can do everything as best as it can be done.  There was one time, we were doing this night scene... it was a scene with him and me on the balcony... It wasn’t going well... And [Cruise] gets so frustrated with having to try and explain that he goes, “Let me just - let’s just go do it. Let’s just rehearse on-camera.” So we rehearsed and they recorded it, and then he goes, “I’ll be you. You be me…” And it was the most unhelpful… I can’t think of anything less revealing. It just pushed me further into a place of terror and insecurity. It was a real shame. And bless him. And I really do mean bless him, because he was trying his damnedest.

The actress described just how the tension showed itself:

I remember at the beginning of the night, seeing this slight red mark on his nose, and by the end of the night, I kid you not - this is how his metabolism is so fierce - he had a big whitehead where that red dot was. It would take anyone else 48 hours to manifest a zit. I saw it growing, and it was like the zit was me, just getting bigger and bigger.  I remember calling [ Beloved director] Jonathan Demme. I described the night to him: “A nightmare.” As I was describing it, it was clear that I thought I was the big f*cking problem. And Jonathan was like, “Thandie, shame on you for not backing yourself.” He was really sweet. And then Tom called and I thought, Oh, this is it. The apology. No, he was just like, “We’re going to reshoot this next week…” And the next time we shot it, I went in there and I just basically manifested all the - because I realized what he wanted. He just wanted this alpha b****. And I did as best as I could. It’s not the best way to get the best work out of someone.

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Tom Cruise's crazy, clever comeback attempt

Hollywood's weirdest star plays a tabloid version of himself in the demented action-comedy "knight and day", by andrew o'hehir.

June, the klutzy-cute heroine of "Knight and Day" played by Cameron Diaz, knows right away that renegade CIA agent and/or psychopath Roy Miller is the guy for her. It becomes even more obvious after Roy hijacks a plane, kills everyone on it except June, slips her a date-rape drug and breaks into her Boston apartment to put her to bed. Then, to close the deal, he shoots her charming, lunkhead-ish firefighter ex-boyfriend. OK, just in the leg. Before fleeing the scene of that particular crime, Roy exchanges a dudely handshake with the downed fireman, assuring him he hasn't fractured his thigh or severed his femoral artery. "It could be the best thing that ever happened to him," Roy purrs to June. "He'll be a hero."

That's among the funnier and more effective moments in this deranged and uneven action-comedy-romance, but it speaks to what makes the movie work, when it does work, and also to what makes it nuts, which it mostly is. Roy is of course played by Tom Cruise, and "Knight and Day" is both a comeback vehicle for that half-tarnished superstar and a movie that adopts his damaged public persona as its theme and subject. We already know that women not-so-secretly love the bad boys, but this movie informs us that they're also hot for the batshit-crazy boys, especially when they come with Tom Cruise's shock of hair, Tom Cruise's alarmingly hairless Ken-doll chest and Tom Cruise's billion-dollar smile. Or maybe all those things have to come attached to Tom Cruise's demented, cult-leader overconfidence and sense of purpose.

During the course of June's herky-jerky odyssey with Roy -- which begins in the Wichita airport, right before he commandeers that flight to Boston, shoots the passengers and crew and crash-lands in a cornfield -- June is drugged and abducted not once but several times. She wakes up on a South Sea island, on a train through the Austrian Alps and in her own bed, never knowing how she got any to those places. (Roy has left helpful little word-balloon Post-Its all over her apartment, along with breakfast.)

Oh, and along the way Roy keeps dressing and undressing June, and generally behaving a bit too much like a lonely fetishist with an inflatable doll. When she inquires exactly how Roy get her out of her clothes and into a fetching cornflower-yellow bikini for their brief sojourn on that South Pacific island -- "No one's ever found me here," he says, right before the fighter planes appear -- he insists it was chaste. He is a secret agent trained to assemble and disassemble firearms in total darkness, after all. Many of the jokes in this rousing but nonsensical film are at least medium-funny, but that one edges a little too close to what you tell the cops after you get arrested with a Kardashian in the basement.

All of this, along with the movie's death-defying stunts (some performed by Cruise himself) and its howlingly implausible yarn involving federal agents gone rogue, various European gangsters and a perpetual-motion machine, is presented as good wholesome fun, just a little song-and-dance to entertain us in a generally meaningless summer movie. Which is pretty much the justification for the overly intense, refugee-from-the-meth-lab screen persona Cruise has been projecting for more than two decades, here cranked up even beyond his normal parameters.

Cruise has always played characters who believe in themselves passionately, even if their faith seems misplaced or bizarre. Early in his career he projected a brash, all-American machismo that moviegoers sucked up repeatedly in "Top Gun," "The Color of Money," "Cocktail" and other '80s hits. But that certainty and drive can also be played for inspiration, as in "Born on the Fourth of July," for supposed dramatic complexity, as in "Minority Report" and "Jerry Maguire," and even for comedy, as with Cruise's ponytailed man-healer in "Magnolia" and with Les Grossman, the super-agent from "Tropic Thunder" who's about to become his own franchise.

It scarcely needs mentioning that Cruise's off-screen persona appears to present exactly the same manic or demonic self-belief, at least for public consumption, and that in this century Cruise the movie actor has increasingly been held hostage by Cruise the perceived weirdo. Aided by phalanges of managers, publicists, producers and directors, Cruise has pursued various strategies to try to recapture the bulletproof stardom that crested 10 years ago with "Mission: Impossible II" and began to trend sharply downhill after his divorce from Nicole Kidman.

Ignoring his image problems and mounting stodgy, expensive dramas clearly hasn't been working (I hadn't even remembered that Cruise was in "Valkyrie" two years ago until I looked it up), so now we get director James Mangold's "Knight and Day," a mashup of Bond-style action and screwball comedy with a tangled production and marketing history -- previous titles have included "Wichita" and "Trouble Man," both better than this one -- that reportedly cost $120 million and is causing Fox executives many Maalox moments. This seems like a conscious effort to turn Cruise's troubled image to his advantage, which is both a clever idea and a moderately creepy one.

You could also use those adjectives to describe Roy Miller, who goes from eerie, wisecracking calm to trigger-twitch near-psychosis as easily as he leaps from one Salzburg rooftop to the next. He bears a strong resemblance to that super-excited guy we saw jumping up and down on Oprah Winfrey's couch. Roy is like a meta-Cruise or a Cruise pastiche; even the disturbing, stalkerish aspects of his character seem as if they were constructed from tabloid stories about the actor's marriage, his religious affiliation, his sexual identity.

Cruise retains an unusual charisma and a natural feeling for the camera; at age 48 (as of next week) he's as handsome as ever, with a touch more character around the eyes and mouth. When pointed in the right direction, he's a highly effective instrument, but he long ago became so powerful that he sets his own terms (rarely a good idea for actors). His persona has always had a knife-edge quality; to millions of fans he was brash and irresistible, but to others he was always a robo-dumbass. This is a shrewd and lively performance, fueled by some degree of calculated self-mockery, but I'm not sure it's enough to change public perception in any widespread fashion.

Mangold, also the director of "3:10 to Yuma" and "Walk the Line," handles the ludicrous extremes of Patrick O'Neill's screenplay with style, delivering what's essentially an absurd farce as if it were a semi-serious globetrotting thriller along the lines of Matt Damon's "Bourne" series. I don't expect "Knight and Day" to prosper enormously or return Cruise to the apex of Hollywood's pyramid, but it's a nifty popcorn flick with hellacious stunts and quite a few laughs -- as long as you're not bothered by the enormous body count and the thoroughly gruesome portrait of men, women and the crazy thing that happens between them.

As for Cameron Diaz, who is apparently mounting a comeback effort of her own -- not counting the "Shrek" films, her only hit since appearing with Cruise in "Vanilla Sky" in 2001 has been "What Happens in Vegas" -- she spends most of the movie either shrieking or sleeping, and is appealing enough in both instances. June is supposed to be the audience's portal into Roy's nutso spy-vs.-spy world, a regular gal sucked into an incredible situation, and so on. It kind of works, or almost does, but there's a punch line: What do single women pushing 40 yearn for? A man, of course! A real man, a manly man, one who pays attention to them and takes them places. Preferably under general anesthetic.

Andrew O'Hehir is executive editor of Salon.

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