In 1991, Reader’s Digest featured excerpts from an in-depth investigative piece from Time magazine entitled Scientology: The Cult of Greed. So how did Reader's Digest land the interview with Tom Cruise?
By caving in to a long list of bizarre demands. According to well-placed sources at the magazine, to ensure Cruise’s cooperation, the Digest’s reporter, Meg Grant, promised to give “Scientology issues” equal play in her profile of the star, and agreed to enroll in a one-day Church “immersion course.” Before the interview took place, our sources say, the magazine also agreed to submit its questions for Cruise to his Church handlers, who weeded out any queries they deemed inappropriate. But they were still not taking any chances. When the exclusive interview finally took place, one of Cruise’s handlers asked the star the list of pre-approved questions, as Grant recorded Cruise’s responses.Those clever little Scientologists. Despite the threat of there being no Mission: Impossible 3, the show will go on after all. Filming of the bloated action fest will start July 18.But, after some prodding, Grant admitted she was indeed put through an immersion course in Scientology, but that it was a surprise. “Before the interview, I went to a lunch with [Cruise’s sister/publicist] Lee Anne DeVette, which turned out to be at the Scientology Celebrity Center, and turned out to be not a lunch but a six hour tour of the center,” she says. After the tour, Grant says she was taken to the church’s “anti-psychiatry museum” on Melrose Ave. (at which point her guides made clear they somehow knew her husband was a practicing psychiatrist).
“I suppose I could have left at any time, but it would have been awkward,” she says.
We're still trying to recover from TomKat's appearance at the premiere for Batman Begins.
Reader's Digest On Cruise Control [Radar Online]
Cruise Makes 'Mission: Impossible 3' Deal [AP]
the "I love this woman" face [cityrag]
