As David Miscavige restored Scientology’s events, here are the celebs who showed up
In March 2019, a full year before the pandemic lockdowns began, Scientology held its annual birthday event for founder L. Ron Hubbard at Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater, Florida, and it marked something of a high-water mark for attendance by big names.
In photos of the crowd posted in a Scientology press release, we spotted both John Travolta and Tom Cruise in the front row, the first time we’d ever seen them both at the same event. Actress Erika Christensen was also there, and we hadn’t seen her at any event before.
Less famous, perhaps, but in some ways a bigger stunner for us was seeing Greta Van Susteren’s husband, retired attorney John Coale, in the front row, as well as the elusive Gottfried Helnwein, the Austrian artist who likes to play down his Scientology involvement.
All in all, it was a pretty stunning turnout for church leader David Miscavige as he presided over the celebration of Hubbard.
A year later, however, literally on the eve of the 2020 LRH Birthday Event, the pandemic lockdowns began and the affair was canceled at the very last minute. Like the rest of the world, Scientology then had to deal with a very different reality.
In 2021, Miscavige began holding the events again, but at the Fort Harrison Hotel auditorium in Clearwater, Florida, while other initiatives, like his Ideal Org program, remained on hold.
Then, with the pandemic having receded, it was time this past fall for Miscavige to return the big annual events to their original locations, starting with the autumn gala of the International Association of Scientologists, the IAS, which traditionally takes place at the UK Headquarters, Saint Hill Manor in East Grinstead, England under a big tent.
He followed that by returning the 2024 New Year’s Event to its proper place at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.
And on March 16, the Hubbard birthday bash returned to Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater, Florida.
Three big events over four months, with the Ideal Org project also being revived. And how was the celebrity involvement?
Well, after we discovered that John Travolta and Elisabeth Moss had attended the Birthday Event, we decided to go back and look through the press releases for the other events to see what we might have missed. Here’s what we found.
The IAS Gala, November 3-5, 2023, Saint Hill Manor, East Grinstead, England
What we already knew: Dharma and Greg actress Jenna Elfman was announced ahead of time by Scientology as the emcee of the Sunday Charity Ball, so we weren’t surprised to see photos of her at the event. (In fact, she posted some of them herself to document what she wore each night of the three-day shindig.)
And Scientology itself put up this somewhat awkward looking portrait of Elfman as she emceed the Sunday night party.
But the big news from the IAS event, of course, was that not only did Tom Cruise fly to the Friday night opening ceremony in his helicopter, but on Saturday, at the Patron’s Ball, he pressed the flesh with the attendees, who then freely posted their photos of the Top Gun actor on their social media feeds.
We’re more convinced than ever that this was encouraged by Scientology, which is normally very secretive about the attendance of celebs, because it wanted to counter months of speculation by tabloids that Cruise had ditched Scientology. (Fat chance.)
We remember hearing from a lot of people who wondered if perpetual celebrity suckup (and The Simpsons voice actress) Nancy Cartwright was in attendance, but we didn’t see any sign of her.
But now, after going back and looking through the Scientology press release, we found this shot of the front row that not only shows Jenna Elfman and her husband Bodhi, but also wealthy donor Trish Duggan (naturally), and next to her, in white, Nancy.
That’s definitely her. And the gent between Jenna and Trish? Has Trish got a new guy? Let us know if you recognize him.
2024 New Year’s Event (taped December 16, 2023), Shrine Auditorium, Los Angeles
We found a couple of intriguing things when we went back to the press release for the New Year’s event in LA. First, Traffic actress Erika Christensen was in the front row, as she had been at the LRH Birthday Event in 2019. The photo is a little blurry, but there’s no mistaking her.
We also found another person in the front row that looks very much to us like Juliette Lewis, in the brown pants.
We know the detail is not sharp, but we asked Geoff Levin for his opinion:
“It does look like her. It’s her body language as well. Check out this current performance photo against that photo.”
Hey, he has a point. Is it Juliette? We tend to think so, but we couldn’t swear to it.
L. Ron Hubbard Birthday Event, March 16, Ruth Eckerd Hall, Clearwater, Florida
We’ve seen John Travolta show up for this event several times, and it doesn’t surprise us too much to see him there: L. Ron Hubbard is his hero, and he lives not too far away in Florida.
But we had never seen Elisabeth Moss at an event before, and seeing her standing next to Travolta, and very pregnant, just really struck us as rather amazing.
As Mike Rinder pointed out, Scientology has lost some major women celebrities in recent years. Kelly Preston and Kirstie Alley moved on to Target Two, Laura Prepon defected, and Lisa Marie Presley defected and passed away.
With Jenna Elfman, Nancy Cartwright, Erika Christensen, perhaps Juliette Lewis, and definitely Elisabeth Moss showing up in addition to Tom Cruise and John Travolta at these restored events, does David Miscavige consider this part of the “expansion” he’s always crowing about?
We asked that very question in a message to Scientology spokeswoman Karin Pouw this week. We’ll let you know if she gets back to us.
Judge denies Jane Doe’s request for emergency hearing
We told you the other day that Jane Doe 1, in her forced marriage lawsuit, had asked the court for an emergency hearing so she could file an affidavit from a new witness.
Her legal team argued that the affidavit is crucial new evidence they want the court to consider before an April 16 hearing, in which Scientology’s motion to have the case forced into its “religious arbitration” is considered.
But Judge Robert Broadbelt said that he had already decided that he’d heard enough from both sides on the issue and “The briefing and evidence presented in connection with defendants’ motion to compel arbitration has been completed and is now closed. The court finds that plaintiff has not shown good cause to grant the relief requested in her ex parte application.”
We hope Jane Doe’s team can find another way to get the affidavit in and get it considered for the April 16 hearing.
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Source Code: Actual things founder L. Ron Hubbard said on this date in history
Avast, Ye Mateys: Snapshots from Scientology’s years at sea
Overheard in the Freezone: Indie Hubbardism, one thought at a time
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One of Jenna Elfman’s outfits for the evening cost more than a sea org member makes in a year.
If the judge has already made up his mind, I hope it is for the plaintiff. The law banning 'arbitration' in sex abuse matters is very clear. No forced 'arbitration' on such matters is allowed.
$cieno clebs are fairly useless in the wog world. No one cares if John Travolta fears Xenu or holds the cans. The same for Tom Cruise, though I am very tired of his reputation managers feeding tabloids his 'did he escape' stories. $cientology is still Ebola coated Kiddie Porn and no 'reputation manager' or counter propaganda is ever going to fix that. Meanwhile, the $cieno clebs are only useful in house. And while getting a selfie with Tom Cruise may be nice, it doesn't pay the rent or even the Clams next donation to whatever 'crusade' is currently running.