25 Years Of Tom Cruise
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Tom Cruise and mother
by Celebrity Features Editor Zoe Drewitt
Tom Cruise was born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV on 3 July 1962 in Syracuse, New York, USA. Tom\'s family moved a lot and it\'s claimed that he went to more than 10 different schools. When he was 11 years old, his mother left his father and Tom and his three sisters settled with her in New Jersey. He has described his father, who died when Tom was in his early 20s, as a "merchant of chaos". Cruise claims that as a child he suffered from dyslexia and was a "functional illiterate."
A man with a calling
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A man with a calling
The young
Cruise attended seminary school for a while and planned to become a Catholic priest, but he was struck by the acting bug and moved to New York to follow his career when he was 18. Cruise got his big break 25 years ago in the teen flick Risky Business in 1983. He played a nerdy teenager who hooks up with a prostitute while his parents are away. Tom dated his co-star on the film,
Rebecca De Mornay, for two and a half years.
Top Gun
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Tom Cruise Top Gun Kelly McGillis
Tom sealed his status as a Hollywood star when he bagged the role of fighter pilot Maverick in 1986\'s biggest grossing film,
Top Gun, with
Kelly McGillis as his leading lady. Top Gun was the quintessential ‘80s movie: hot, buffed young men pumped-up on testosterone, a power ballad that topped the charts and flashy machines that went very fast. It was controversial in some circles, particularly for its glorification of the military and claims that the locker room and volleyball scenes were homoerotic. In 1989 Tom was nominated for a
Razzie award for romantic comedy Cocktail, and also starred alongside Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man.
Finding Scientology
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Tom Cruise Mimi Rogers Scientology
Tom married successful \'80s actress Mimi Rogers, who is six years his senior, in 1987 but they divorced less than three years later. Rogers introduced Cruise to the controversial religion
Scientology. Tom is now the world\'s most famous Scientologist. He caused a stir earlier this year when a
Scientology video was leaked featuring Tom hit the internet. Set to a soundtrack of the Mission Impossible theme, during the interview Tom makes a series of bizarre statements including: "Being a Scientologist, when you drive past an accident... you know you have to do something about it because you know you\'re the only one that can really help, " and, "We are the authorities on getting people off drugs, we are the authorities on the mind, we are the authorities on improving conditions... we can rehabilitate criminals."
Meeting Nicole
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Tom Cruise Nicole Kidman marriage divorce
In 1989 Cruise was nominated for an Oscar for his part in Oliver Stone\'s Born On The Fourth Of July. Tom met his second wife, up-and-coming Australian actress
Nicole Kidman, on the set of ulta-cheesey stock-car racing movie Days Of Thunder, and they married in December 1990. Nicole and Tom adopted two children, Isabella (born 1993) and Connor (born 1995). They starred together in two more films, Far And Away, directed by Ron Howard, and the controversial Eyes Wide Shut, directed by Stanley Kubrick, which featured explicit sex scenes with the couple. They split in August 2001. After Nicole divorced Tom, her career sky-rocketed and she is now one of Hollywood\'s biggest stars. She is
expecting her first biological child with new husband Keith Urban.
Action hero
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Tom Cruise Mission Impossible
In 1996, Cruise produced and starred in Brian De Palma\'s Mission: Impossible, a re-imagining of the ‘60s US TV show of the same name. Cruise returned as the film\'s hero Ethan again in 2000 and 2006. In 2002, he teamed up for the with legendary
Indiana Jones director Steven Spielberg for the first time on sci-fi thriller Minority Report, which propelled co-star
Colin Farrell to A-list status. Tom and Spielberg re-untied on the remake of the HG Wells alien invasion movie, War Of The Worlds.
TomKat
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Tom Cruise Katie Holmes
In 2000, Tom fell for his Spanish actress
Penelope Cruz, who starred with him in Vanilla Sky and the pair dated for three years, splitting in March 2004. Tom\'s high-profile romance with actress
Katie Holmes, who is 16 years his junior, began in April 2005. Katie Holmes shot to fame as Joey Potter in the huge hit teen US television series, Dawson\'s Creek, which ran from 1998 to 2003. Katie Holmes split from her actor fiance; Chris Klein (American Pie) just a few weeks before she started dating Cruise. Chris and Katie had been together for five years.
Couch jumping
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Tom Cruise Steven Spielberg Oprah
In an appearance on the
Oprah Winfrey Show in May 2006, the usually very private Cruise shocked the world by getting so excited about his new romance that he repeatedly whooped and jumped up on Oprah\'s famous sofa, stunning the usually unflappable talk-show host. Tom was doing publicity for War Of The Worlds at the time, and it was rumoured that Steven Spielberg was angry that the TomKat romance was overshadowing the movie. Later that year the movie studio Paramount dropped Cruise, citing his erratic public behaviour and outspokeness about his
Scientology beliefs as the reason for the break.
The engagement
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Tom Cruise Katie Holmes
Tom proposed to Katie early on the morning of 17 June 2006, at the top of the
Eiffel Tower, and the engagement was announced to the press within hours. The media were initially skeptical about the romance, with rumours that the pair were only together as a stunt to promote their movies Batman Begins and Mission: Impossible 3. However, on 6 October 2005 Tom and Katie announced that they were expecting their first baby the following spring.
The wedding
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Tom Cruise Katie Holmes wedding
Daughter Suri was born on 18 April 2006, but suspicions were raised again when no pictures of the baby were released. The world finally got its first glimpse of Suri almost five months later, in a 22-page special in Vanity Fair shot by celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz. Tom and Katie married in Italy near Rome on 18 November 2006. The ceremony was conducted by a Scientologist minister at Odescalchi castle, with a bevy of A-list guests including J.Lo,
Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith, Jim Carrey, Richard Gere,
Victoria Beckham and Brooke Shields. The happy couple flew off on honeymoon to the Maldives.
Movie maker
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Tom Cruise Robert Redford
In November 2006, Tom and his business partner Paula Wagner took over the management of the
United Artists film studio. Since the pair took the helm the studio released the political thriller Lions For Lambs in 2007, which starred Cruise and Robert Redford, and a new film Valkyrie is in production. Directed by X-Men\'s Bryan Singer, Tom stars as Nazi officer
Claus von Stauffenberg, who masterminded an attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler. As with all Cruise projects these days, controversy abounds. Initially there were problems securing locations in Germany because Scientology is considered a cult by the German government. Von Stauffenberg\'s son also spoke out about the film saying, "I fear that only terrible kitsch will come out of the project. It\'s bound to be rubbish. Cruise should keep his hands off my father."
Cruise in control
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Tom Cruise Katie Holmes Suri
Despite all the controversy that surrounds Cruise about his dedication to Scientology and accusations that he is a control freak, he is still without a doubt the biggest star in Hollywood. He has an estimated fortune of $250m. Tom and Katie, kids Isbella, Connor and Suri, and Tom\'s mother and sister live in a $35m mansion in Beverly Hills. The couple\'s showbiz mates, The Beckhams, live only a few minutes away. Last year Cruise is said to have spent $1m dollars on fuel alone for his four private jet planes. Much like the action heroes he plays in his blockbusters, it seems that 45-year-old Cruise is an unstoppable force.
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