Actress and former Scientologist Leah Remini is not yet done spilling the beans on her former church. Now, she is even speaking out against one of the church's most popular members: Tom Cruise.
During an interview with ABC's "20/20," Remini recalled the time in 2005 when Cruise criticised Brooke Shields for using anti-depressants, then argued with Matt Lauer about psychiatry. Then in 2006, the actor notoriously jumped on Oprah's couch to declare his love for Katie Holmes.
When Remini expressed her concerns to officials of Scientology about Cruise's behaviour, she "was immediately dealt with" and was told that "the only reason you're saying these things is because you have your own transgressions."
"I'm saying, 'I don't think he's becoming of a Scientologist, jumping on couches, and attacking Matt Lauer... and attacking Brooke Shields,'" Remini said. "Like... 'What the hell is this guy doing?' We need to rein it in, we need to stop all this, and he just needs to be an actor."
After being reprimanded for her "transgressions" against Cruise, Remini said she immediately felt guilty. "So being critical of Tom Cruise is being critical of Scientology itself," she said. "You are a person who is anti-the aims and goals of Scientology. You are evil."
But that was not all. When the actor got married to Holmes that same year, Remini was invited, but only under the condition that she included her friends Jennifer Lopez and Mark Anthony.
"The Church was really the one who invited them," she said, "on Tom's behalf."
The famous couple agreed to attend, and Remini noticed a lot of off-putting things about the wedding. First of all, Cruise serenaded his bride with the song "You've Lost That Loving Feeling," which is reminiscent of a scene from his movie "Top Gun."
"We're like, 'that's an interesting song to sing to your bride," Remini said.
She also became upset because Scientology leader David Miscavige, who served as Best Man in Cruise's wedding, kept trying to separate Remini from Lopez by making them travel in separate vehicles and sit at different tables.
"They were always trying to extract me," she said. "I could only assume because they wanted to make Jennifer a Scientologist and maybe I was barring that road for them."
For their part, the Church of Scientology said Remini's claims about Cruise's wedding are not only untrue but also "ridiculous and stupid."
After the wedding, Remini said Cruise's new wife filed a Knowledge Report that blamed her for ruining the big wedding. "It starts with, 'I was dismayed at the behaviour of Leah Remini during the events leading up to our wedding... At the wedding, the behaviour as a guest, a friend... was very upsetting,'" Remini said while reading the document.
She was then sent to their Sea Org facility in Clearwater, Florida, for what she calls "reprogramming."
"I was in an auditing room," she said. "Basically they were just trying to get me to recant what I said, to apologise for ruining the wedding of the century." In the Church Scientology, "auditing" is a method of spiritual rehabilitation or a type of counselling in which practitioners aim to re-experience consciously painful or traumatic events in their past, in order to free themselves of their limiting effects.
The Church of Scientology denied making Remini go to their Florida facility and said, "Ms. Remini voluntarily went to the Church to receive religious services. Her characterisations are another example of revisionist history."
