Tom Cruise’s personal life: his three marriages and his role as a frustrated athlete

The Olympic Games bid farewell to Paris with a most iconic image. Tom Cruise, in true Mission Impossible style, made a spectacular entrance by flying down from the top of the Stade de France to grab the flag with the five rings and whisk it away from the venue riding a motorbike. A symbolic way of passing the baton to Los Angeles 2028 by using one of the things that most represents the American city: Hollywood.

The 62-year-old actor’s successful career is not lost on many people. However, his personal life is much more complex than people can even imagine. As a child, he experienced many family complications following his parents’ divorce, including physical abuse, and constantly being on the move with no real base. So much so that he ended up enrolled in 14 different schools where, in addition, he did not receive adequate attention for his dyslexia.

Such a difficult childhood left him with an unshakeable faith. In fact, he considered entering a convent as a Franciscan monk, but in the end he chose acting. As luck would have it, offers soon began to arrive when he was only 19 years old and, since then, he has not stopped acting and producing box office hits. However, things could have been very different if he had succeeded in hockey or wrestling, a sport in which he would have been a professional if he had not injured his knee.

Tom Cruise’s intimate relationships

Although he is an actor who keeps his personal life as private as possible, the public nature of his image makes it almost impossible to escape from the cameras. He is currently known to have several serious romantic relationships and three marriages, none of which last today. Rebecca De Mornay (three years), Cher (two years) and Penelope Cruz (three years) were just a few of the women with whom he shared part of his life.

Tom Cruise: marriages and Scientology

In 1987, Cruise married actress Mimi Rogers, although they separated three years later. That same year, with hardly any mourning left, he married legendary Australian-American actress Nicole Kidman. Together they had two children: Bella and Connor, both adopted.

The two actors announced their separation in February 2001 and were divorced later that year. In November 2005, the Top Gun actor was headed back down the aisle, marrying actress Katie Holmes. Their relationship gave birth to the actor’s first and only biological daughter, Suri, in 2006.

But just a few years later, their relationship was over. Holmes filed for divorce on 29 June 2012, allegedly to protect Suri from his religious connections.

Over time, Cruise has become a fervent believer in ‘Scientology’, a religion that maintains that humans are beings whose spirit is immortal but that, during their life, they have forgotten their nature. To recover it, the faithful relive experiences from their past to free themselves from their negative burden.