In Tom Cruise, Scientology puts its best face forward

GILMAN HOT SPRINGS, Calif. — Nearly 30 years ago, the Church of Scientology bought a dilapidated and bankrupt resort in Gilman Hot Springs and turned the erstwhile haven for Hollywood moguls and starlets into a retreat for L. Ron Hubbard, the science-fiction writer who founded the religion.

Today, the out-of-the-way 500-acre compound has grown into one of Scientology's major bases of operation, with thriving video and recording studios, elaborate offices and a multimillion-dollar mansion.

As with the previous owners, the church has used the property as a sanctuary for its own stars. It is here, former members say, that Hollywood's most bankable actor, Tom Cruise, was courted for the cause by Scientology's most powerful leader, David Miscavige.

Scientology has long recruited Hollywood luminaries. But the close friendship of these two men for nearly 20 years and their mutual devotion to Hubbard help explain Cruise's transformation from just another celebrity parishioner into the public face of the church.

The bond between the star and his spiritual leader was evident last year when the two traded effusive words and crisp salutes at a Scientology gala in England. Calling Cruise "the most dedicated Scientologist I know," Miscavige presented him with the church's first Freedom Medal of Valor.

"Thank you for your trust, thank you for your confidence in me," Cruise replied, according to Scientology's Impact magazine. "I have never met a more competent, a more intelligent, a more tolerant, a more compassionate being outside of what I have experienced from LRH. And I've met the leaders of leaders. I've met them all."

Scientologists believe that humans are spiritual beings, with many past and future lives. Founded in 1954, Scientology is a religion without a deity. It teaches that "spiritual release and freedom" can be achieved through Hubbard's "religious technology," which relies on counseling and rehabilitation to cope with depression, addiction, mental illness and other problems.

Miscavige, 45, has found in Cruise, 43, not just a famous believer but also an effective messenger whose passion Scientology has harnessed to help fuel its worldwide growth.

"Across 90 nations, 5,000 people hear his word of Scientology — every hour," International Scientology News proclaimed last year. "Every minute of every hour someone reaches for LRH technology ... simply because they know Tom Cruise is a Scientologist."

Cruise and Miscavige declined requests for interviews.

Unique among celebrities

Cruise's dedication is not new. Long before he sprang onto Oprah Winfrey's couch, jabbed an accusing finger at Matt Lauer and blasted Brooke Shields for taking antidepressants, Cruise undertook intensive Scientology study and counseling at the church's compound, according to current and former Scientologists.

The vast majority of Scientologists train at the church's better-known facilities, including those in Hollywood and Clearwater, Fla. Cruise also has trained at those locations, but for much of his studies in the late 1980s and early 1990s, he headed to Gilman Hot Springs.

He stayed for weeks at a time, arriving by car or helicopter, according to former Scientologists who saw him there on repeated occasions. The former resort, 90 miles east of Los Angeles, was an ideal place for Cruise to get out of the spotlight while focusing on his Scientology training, former members say.

It is described by former members as the church's international nerve center, whose barbed-wired perimeter and driveways are monitored by video cameras and motion sensors. Some also remember a perch high in the hills, dubbed "Eagle," where staff members with telescopes jotted down license plate numbers of any vehicle that lingered too long near the compound.

Behind the guarded gates, Cruise had a personal supervisor to oversee his studies in a private course room, former members say. He was unique among celebrities in the amount of time he spent at the base, they say.

"I was there for eight years and nobody stayed long at all, except for Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman during that period," said Bruce Hines, who left Scientology in 2001 after three decades in the group.

While at the complex, Cruise stayed in a renovated bungalow near a golf course on the property.

"It was sort of like an upscale country place," said Karen Schless Pressley, a former Scientology "image officer," whose duties included interior design and creating military-style uniforms for Scientology staff members.

While hardly palatial, the guest digs where Cruise stayed were luxurious compared with the drab apartments of nearby Hemet, Calif., where Schless Pressley and hundreds of other base staff members lived, with few amenities and almost no privacy.

She and other former members say Miscavige saw to Cruise's every need, assigning a special staff to prepare his meals, do his laundry and handle a variety of other tasks, some of which required around-the-clock work.

$45 million expansion

For years, the property has been home to Golden Era Productions, where Scientologists churn out videos, audio recordings and "e-meters," to be sold to church members. Mike Rinder, head of Scientology International's Office of Special Affairs, said nearly all have signed billion-year contracts to serve the church.

Since 1998, the church has poured at least $45 million into expansion of the property, public records show.

The most striking building is a new mansion, dubbed "Bonnie View," that sits on a hill, uninhabited. It was built, former members say, for the church founder, who died in secrecy on a ranch near San Luis Obispo amid a federal tax investigation that was dropped after his death. The mansion has a lap pool and a movie theater and was completed in 2000 at a cost of nearly $9.4 million, property records show.

"The whole theory of that house was that before Hubbard died in 1986, David Miscavige told us, Hubbard told him he was going to come back and make himself visible within 13 years," Schless Pressley said.

"It's preserved because the life of L. Ron Hubbard is extremely important to Scientologists," Rinder said.

Although Miscavige's living quarters and offices in renovated bungalows were modest compared with Bonnie View, they reflected his taste for the best of the best, former members said. And although they describe him as extremely demanding of those under his command, they say he treated Cruise "like a king."

Shelly Britt, who joined Scientology at 17, said she was at the base for 20 years before leaving the church in 2002. Among other things, Britt said, Miscavige and his wife attended the star's 1990 wedding to Kidman in Colorado and followed up with frequent gifts.

"They don't do that for every celebrity," she said. "I remember one time I had to go pick up one of those big fancy picnic baskets, and china and silver, and take it out to Burbank to Tom's pilot."

Rinder said Cruise was treated no differently from other church members and his highly public support of Scientology came straight from his heart.

More than any other celebrity, Cruise has helped fuel the growth of the church, which claims a worldwide membership of 10 million and in the past two years has opened major centers in South Africa, Russia, the United Kingdom and Venezuela.

Cruise continues to climb the "Bridge to Total Freedom," Scientology's path to enlightenment. International Scientology News, a church magazine, reported last year that the actor had embarked on an advanced level of training, "OT VII," for Operating Thetan VII.

At that high level, former members said, devotees are charged with actively spreading the organization's beliefs and advancing its crusades, including Hubbard's deep disdain for psychiatry, a profession that once dismissed his teachings as quackery.

"When you hear Tom Cruise talking about psychiatrists and drugs," said one prominent former Scientologist who knows Cruise, "you are hearing from the grave the voice of L. Ron Hubbard speaking."