thomas cruise mapother dad

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Tom Cruise Talks About His Father

April 3, 2006 / 2:09 PM EDT / CBS/AP

Tom Cruise is talking about what has long been known to be a sore subject.

In an interview with Parade magazine, the 43-year-old actor looks back on two difficult aspects of his early years: his father and bullies at school.

Cruise says his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III, "was a bully and a coward... the kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you. It was a great lesson in my life - how he'd lull you in, make you feel safe and then, bang!"

"For me," Cruise told Parade, it was like, "'There's something wrong with this guy. Don't trust him. Be careful around him.' There's that anxiety."

The 5'7" star of the upcoming film, "Mission: Impossible III," also says he was harassed by his classmates while he was growing up.

"So many times the big bully comes up, pushes me," he recalled. "Your heart's pounding, you sweat, and you feel like you're going to vomit ... I don't like bullies."

When Cruise was 12, his mother, Mary Lee, left his father and took Cruise and his sister, Lee Anne, with her, the magazine says. His parents divorced in 1974.

Cruise says he reunited with his father ten years later, when Mapother was "in the hospital dying of cancer, and he would only meet me on the basis that I didn't ask him anything about the past."

"When I saw him in pain, I thought, 'Wow, what a lonely life,"' Cruise says. "He was in his late 40s. It was sad."

Cruise has made a point of staying close to others in his immediate family, including his mother, and one of his three sisters, Lee Anne DeVette, is publicist for both Cruise and his 27-year-old fiancée, Katie Holmes.

Holmes is in the final stages of pregnancy with a baby whose gender has not been revealed – although she and Cruise very likely know the answer to that one. It was widely reported months ago that the excited expectant dad bought an ultrasound machine so he and Holmes could take as many photos as they wanted – at home.

The baby is the first for Holmes and a third child for Cruise, who has two other children from the over ten years that he was married to actress Nicole Kidman.

They split up nearly five years ago but that doesn't mean Cruise is out of the picture when it comes to the kids.

He's on call as dad and four years ago, caught the attention of the evening gown set when he ducked out early from the Academy Awards ceremony, headed home for his turn with the children.

Cruise is similarly focused on the impending arrival of the new baby and recently told interviewers in Germany that he had two pilots standing by, ready to fly him home, if Holmes happened to go into labor.

The two are engaged but haven't yet tied the knot.

They plan to marry this year, Cruise said, in an interview with the German tabloid Bild, after the opening and the promotions for his latest movie, "Mission Impossible III."

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Thomas Cruise Mapother III: How Did Tom Cruise’s Father Die?

Post author: Ruth Kai Botchway
Post published: March 8, 2023
Post category: Lifestyle and People
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Who Is Tom Cruise’s Father?

Thomas Cruise Mapother III is the father of Thomas Cruise Mapother IV popularly known as Tom Cruise. Thomas’ son Tom Cruise is an American actor and producer. He is one of the world’s highest-paid actors and undoubtedly one of the most-watched movie stars. He has largely starred in science fiction and action films, establishing himself as an action star, often performing his own risky stunts.

Thomas Cruise Mapother III: Bio Summary

Who is thomas cruise mapother iii.

Thomas Cruise Mapother III is best known as the father of award-winning actor Tom Cruise. Thomas was born on 15 October 1934, in Saint Matthews, Jefferson County, Kentucky, USA to Thomas Cruise Mapother and Catherine Reibert Mapother. Thomas is the brother of William Reibert Mapother, Sr. Thomas was an electrical engineer. He was married to special education teacher Mary Lee (née Pfeiffer; 1936–2017). Just like his wife Mary, Thomas was from Louisville, Kentucky, and had English, German, and Irish ancestry.

Also Read: Mary Lee Pfeiffer: What Happened To Tom Cruise’s Mother?

Thomas Cruise Mapother III and Mary Lee Pfeiffer are the parents of Thomas Cruise Mapother IV (Tom Cruise), Cass Mapother , Marian Mapother , and Lee Ann Mapother . They grew up in near poverty. Today, their son Tom Cruise is a movie star. He has made significant impact on cinema.

Tom Cruise has been able to achieve extraordinary success as an actor and producer, besides being a successful philanthropist. He is an outspoken advocate for the Church of Scientology, which he credits with helping him overcome dyslexia. His career spans more than three decades.

Tom Cruise is considered a global cultural icon. However, Thomas and Mary gave their children a Catholic upbringing. Thomas also got employed as a defense consultant with the Canadian Armed Forces and his family moved in late 1971 to Beacon Hill, Ottawa.

ALSO, READ; Cass Mapother: Facts About Tom Cruise’s Sister

Describing his father Thomas III, Tom Cruise said his father was “a merchant of chaos”, a “bully”, and a “coward” who beat his children. According to Tom:

‘[My father] was the kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you. It was a great lesson in my life—how he’d lull you in, make you feel safe, and then, bang! For me, it was like, ‘There’s something wrong with this guy. Don’t trust him. Be careful around him.’

Thomas Cruise Mapother III and Mary Lee Pfeiffer eventually got separated. Mary left Thomas and she took her children along with her to the United States. In 1978, Mary married again. She got married to Jack South. Thomas also got married to Joan Kaplan Lebendiger.

How Did Thomas Cruise Mapother III Die?

The Top Gun movie star, Tom Cruise’s father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III was killed by cancer. He took his last breath on the 9th of January 1984, in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky, USA. He was at the age of 49 when he died. His son Tom Cruise visited him while he was in the hospital.

Also Read: Emmanuel Streisand: How Did Barbra Streisand’s Father Die?

Tom Cruise reunited with his father Thomas at the time he was in the hospital dying of cancer. He said he would only meet his son on the basis that he didn’t ask him anything about the past. Tom Cruise said: “When I saw him in pain, I thought, ‘Wow, what a lonely life. He was in his late 40s. It was sad.” Thomas Cruise Mapother III’s ex-wife Mary Lee Pfeiffer died at age 80, on 7 February 2017, in Los Angeles County, California, USA.

We strive for accuracy and fairness. If you see something that doesn't look right and needs corrections, Kindly contact us !

Ruth Kai Botchway

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Tom Cruise’s Family History & the Mapother Name Origin .

If you’re interested in genealogy, a fascinating way to explore it is by researching famous people and their family trees. One celebrity whose ancestry can be traced back to Ireland is Tom Cruise, the actor known for the films Mission Impossible, The Color of Money, and Risky Business, among others.

Cruise’s Irish origins can be traced through the Cruise and Mapother surnames. Read on to discover the extensive research we’ve done on this family line. We’ll explore the family’s history, immigration to the US, and some interesting stories and historical figures from Cruise’s family tree.

What Is Tom Cruise’s Ethnicity?

Tom Cruise’s full name is Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, after his father, Thomas Mapother III. The paternal side of his family is Irish, though the Mapother surname has early origins in England.

The Mapother name made its first known appearance in Devon several centuries ago, as the family had a seat as Lords of the Manor . There are many known variations of the Mapother name, including Maypowter, Maypower, Mapower, and Mapowder.

Tom Cruise’s Family Roots

The Cruise family made their first appearance in Ireland in the twelfth century. A Cruise was a knight who came to Ireland with the infamous Strongbow, whose invasion led to the English conquest of Ireland.

Afterwards, the Cruises were granted land in north Dublin. They established themselves in the area and remained there for many generations.

They were a well-connected Catholic gentry family who maintained their religion and their status despite the upheavals of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The family intermarried with local gentry families, and one branch became known as the Russell Cruises.

Immigration to the United States

In 1825, Patrick Russell Cruise married Teresa Johnson. Together, the family moved to the United States around 1826. Patrick Cruise’s land was managed indirectly through a local land agent during his time in America.

However, just before the Irish Famine, he became unhappy with the actions of his land agent, who had forced many families out of their homes. Patrick Cruise returned to Ireland around 1843 to give these lands back to his tenants.

The youngest known child of Patrick Russell Cruise was Mary Paulina Russell Cruise, born in New Jersey in 1832. She married Dillon Henry Mapother, an engineer from Dublin, in 1858. They had several children before Dillon died around 1874.

After Mapother’s death, Mary Paulina Mapother married Thomas O’Mara. The couple had one known son, Thomas O’Mara, in 1876. He was Tom Cruise’s great-grandfather.

Thomas O’Mara Senior died between the 1880 and 1890 US censuses. His son assumed the surname Cruise Mapother, as it was the surname of his siblings. Interestingly, if this ancestor hadn’t changed his name, Tom Cruise’s last name would be O’Mara.

Recent Family History

Tom Cruise’s parents, Thomas Mapother III and Mary Lee Pfeiffer were originally from Louisville, Kentucky. They married and had four children: Tom, Lee Anne, Marian, and Cass Cruise.

Tom Cruise was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, New York. His family relocated to Canada when his father took a job with the Canadian Armed Forces. The Top Gun actor’s parents divorced when he was in sixth grade, and he moved with his mother and sisters back to the US.

Family and Career

Tom Cruise has been married to actress Nicole Kidman, Mimi Rogers, and Katie Holmes. He has two adopted children with Nicole Kidman: Connor and Isabella Cruise. The actor also has a daughter named Suri Cruise with Katie Holmes.

Cruise is known for his activity in the church of Scientology and roles in many well-known films, including the franchise Mission Impossible, Vanilla Sky, and Jerry Maguire. He has won several Golden Globe Awards, among many other accolades for his performances over the years.

Tom Cruise Discusses His Irish Ancestry

On a trip to Ireland in 2013, Tom Cruise discovered more about his Irish family history. Expert genealogists Fiona Fitzsimons and Helen Moss were able to trace his ancestry back as far as the early twelfth century. Watch Tom Cruise discover our research and receive his Certificate of Irish Heritage in the video below.

Cruise has continued to share his delight with our hard work over the years. Watch Tom talk about his Irish family history on Jimmy Kimmel Live in the video below.

Turn to the Experts When Researching Your Irish Roots

Learning about Tom Cruise’s family history may pique your curiosity about your own. Luckily, there are resources available to help you to find as many details on your ancestry as we uncovered on Cruise’s family line.

If you’re interested in researching your Irish family history, the team at Irish Family History Centre can help. Contact us today to learn how we can help you unlock new pieces of your family’s story.

Discover your family history .

The Tragic Real-Life Story Of Tom Cruise

Fame and fortune bring with them many perks: freedom from want, tickets to anywhere in the world, the adoration of millions, and immense power in one's chosen field. Tom Cruise has enjoyed his fair share of them all. Described by France24 as the last survivor of the age of the movie star, Cruise has retained his status as an internationally beloved actor for decades, and per the Hollywood Reporter , that has translated into a great deal of authority over the movies he stars in. Couple that kind of success with genuine acting talent and endearing good looks even as he enters his 60s, and it's easy to think that Cruise hasn't a care in the world.

But fame and fortune aren't a cure-all. They can't blot out humble beginnings or past tragedies. They aren't a safeguard against heartbreak and loss. In the publicity-mad world of Hollywood, particularly in the age of the internet, fame and fortune can buy some privacy and security, but not enough to blot out controversy. For all that a four-decade career as an actor has brought him, a closer look reveals that Cruise hasn't always lived such a charmed existence.

He grew up poor, nomadic, and abused

During perhaps the most controversial period of his career, in the early 2000s, Tom Cruise gave a lengthy interview to Parade about his upbringing. He was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, New York, with the birth name of Thomas Cruise Mapother IV. His father held the same name, one generation back, and his mother was Mary Lee. With three sisters to care for along with their son, the Mapothers struggled to make ends meet. Mapother III had no luck keeping down a job as an electrical engineer, and the family was often on the move as he sought work. Mary Lee became the primary breadwinner, working up to three jobs at a time to keep the family going.

But if Mapother III didn't provide, he exercised control over his family in other ways. In " Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography ," Andrew Morton suggests that the father's handling of his son crossed the line from tough love into physical abuse more than once. And apart from any life lessons, the actor recalled that when life didn't go his father's way, he took it out on those around him. "[My father] was the kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you," he told Parade. "He was a bully and a coward."

If you or someone you know may be the victim of child abuse, please contact the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child (1-800-422-4453) or contact their live chat services .

He was bullied for his dyslexia

Bullies can latch onto anything to use as an attack, and the young Tom Cruise gave them plenty of ammunition, according to his 2006 Parade interview. He was often the new kid; being part of a family that was always moving, Cruise claimed he went to 15 schools in 12 years (Andrew Morton gives the number as five in " Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography "). Coming from a poor family, he wore the "wrong" clothes. He was on the short side even then – a fact that didn't deter Cruise from fighting back against the bullies who came for him. "I never liked hitting someone, but I know if I don't hit that guy hard he's going to pick on me all year," he recalled.

One of the biggest targets on Cruise's back was his struggles in the classroom. From an early age, he found it impossible to read and ended up in remedial classes, attracting more attention from bullies. He was 7 years old by the time a school-referred psychiatrist diagnosed him with dyslexia. Having a name for the problem didn't immediately solve it, however. Cruise found the experience of being "labeled" upsetting, and he later traced his rejection of psychiatry as a science to this early diagnosis.

He's had to work since he was 8

Lots of kids pick up odd jobs around the neighborhood. Maybe they take them on for a lark, or maybe they aim to pick up a little spending money for candy, games, or outings. For a young Tom Cruise, odd jobs were how he paid for movie tickets, which were a passion of his from age 4 on, according to People (via CNBC ). In the days before home video, YouTube, and streaming, the only way to take in the movies was at the theater, so a portion of Cruise's income from mowing lawns, delivering papers, and other bits of work went to the box office.

Circumstances wouldn't allow him to sink all his earnings into movie tickets, however. Money was so tight for Cruise's household that, on one occasion, they forwent Christmas presents and gave each other poems instead. Cruise's mother attempted to keep up with multiple jobs, but any contribution her children could make was welcome and often needed. So a portion of Cruise's income from his neighborhood tasks went toward the necessities of life.

His dreams of priesthood were undone by vice

These days, Tom Cruise can hardly be mentioned without some reference to the Church of Scientology, of which he is so prominently – and so controversially – a part. But Cruise grew up in a traditional Catholic household, and well into his college years, Catholicism is where he sought spirituality. For a time, according to Andrew Morton's " Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography ," Cruise entertained the idea of becoming a Franciscan priest. To that end, he enrolled in the St. Francis Seminary of Cincinnati, though the appeal wasn't entirely a matter of faith. "We didn't have the money back then, and I went for the education for a year, and it was free," Cruise later explained.

The experience of seminary was apparently a happy one for Cruise. Sports, hobby shops, and even the discipline of boarding school life appealed to him. Maintaining that discipline proved a challenge, however, when there was no shortage of local girls. Cruise, even then, possessed the gift of charm. He would later say that women were too appealing to sacrifice even to the Franciscan order, and he and the seminary have claimed that he left voluntarily.

But a friend from St. Francis, Shane Dempler, insisted to the Cincinnati Seminal that Cruise's priestly ambitions were genuine. The real end to that dream, said Dempler, came when he and Cruise were caught robbing the Franciscans of their booze.

His father's unhappy end

The abuse that Thomas Cruise Mapother III inflicted on his family came to a head in 1974. This, writes Andrew Morton in " Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography ," is when Mapother's verbal attacks, secret drinking, and instability became too much for his wife Mary Lee. In a momentous decision for a devout Catholic woman of her generation, she took the children, left Mapother, and filed for divorce. It was a significant financial gamble as well as a personal upheaval; Mapother was not prepared to provide child support.

Tom Cruise, 12 at the time, did not mourn his father's absence from home. When Mapother followed his family to Kentucky and attempted to reach out to his son, Cruise firmly rejected him. Morton writes that, when Mapother remarried, Cruise put in a dutiful appearance at the ceremony. Once it was over, he abstained from all contact with his father, his new stepmother, and his stepsiblings.

Some effort at reconciliation was made in the 1980s, after Cruise's acting career had begun. By then, Mapother was gravely ill, wasting away from cancer in his late 40s. He imposed a condition on the reunion: no questions about the past. Cruise accepted his father's terms and met with him in the hospital. Later, he could only describe the final encounter as "sad."

His first marriage was brief but consequential

Tom Cruise hasn't hesitated to defend Scientology , as in an infamous " 60 Minutes Australia " interview. He credits it with helping him overcome his learning disabilities. But as more details of the organization's unsavory practices have emerged over the years, Cruise's membership in Scientology and the role it plays in his life have been fodder for rumor, tabloid gossip, and investigative books and documentaries.

According to The Hollywood Reporter , Cruise joined Scientology during his first marriage, to Mimi Rogers. While he maintains that he didn't join because of Rogers, she did bring him into a family with longstanding ties. Rogers' parents had connections to L. Ron Hubbard himself. As a means to grow his following (per Andrew Morton in " Tom Cruise ") Hubbard developed "Project Celebrity," a targeted recruitment of the famous, once-famous, or soon-to-be-famous. Cruise's star was on the rise when he and Rogers got together in the 1980s, and church head David Miscavige saw the acquisition of such a hot up-and-comer as a coup at a precarious time in Scientology's history (per Morton ).

According to Lawrence Wright's " Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief ," Rogers became a hindrance to Scientology's ambitions for Cruise. While she helped to bring him in, her family was no longer in good standing with the church – not the sort of people to help its profile. The marriage was already troubled, but church "mediators" helped to push Cruise and Rogers apart in 1990.

He almost left the Church Of Scientology

From its very beginning, Scientology has attracted chilling accusations. Ex-member Leah Remini's A&E series "Scientology and the Aftermath" was an often damning insight into many of the charges, including fraud, extortion, obstruction of justice, intimidation of critics, and brainwashing. Remini described Tom Cruise as brainwashed when promoting her series through Variety , though she also stated to The Daily Beast that Cruise is well aware of the truth of the organization.

Cruise has never claimed to be brainwashed and never acknowledged any uncouth practices by his religion. He hasn't spoken of any issues he has with the church either. But according to The Daily Beast , after his first marriage to Mimi Rogers ended and he became romantically involved with Nicole Kidman in the 1990s, Cruise's attachment to Scientology wavered. In part, this was due to his infatuation with Kidman; the attraction had already led him away from his first marriage. Kidman became a Scientologist for Cruise, but when she reached her limit with the church and its leader, David Miscavige, Cruise appeared to follow her lead.

Another factor keeping Cruise away from Scientology was Stanley Kubrick – or rather, the filming of Kubrick's "Eyes Wide Shut" in England. The record-breaking 46-week shoot meant that Cruise and Kidman were out of easy reach of Miscavige, and away from the household staff who spied on them on his behalf. But Miscavige, who coveted Cruise as a tempting lure for recruits, was unwilling to let him go.

Scientology brought down his second marriage

Tom Cruise was deeply in love with Nicole Kidman when they first met and worked together (per The Daily Beast ) and the Church of Scientology was there to fan the flames. Journalist Tony Ortega is quoted by the Beast as saying that the organization's leaders felt their romance would be a passing fancy, a way to separate Cruise from his then-wife Mimi Rogers and her family of disreputable church members. Cruise becoming so committed to Kidman that he eventually married her was unexpected – and unwelcome.

Like Cruise, Kidman came from a Catholic background and once entertained a lifetime of service within a Catholic order. But Kidman's father was also a prominent psychologist, a profession that is among the great evils inflicting humanity according to Scientology's teachings. Even worse was her stepping into Scientology, leaving, and taking Cruise with her. Sources have claimed that church head David Miscavige personally ordered an operation to sink Cruise and Kidman's marriage and get the star back in the church.

The lengths Scientology went to break up the couple included sending private investigators after Kidman, tapping her phones (allegedly on Cruise's wish), and subjecting Cruise himself to relentless "auditing." This practice, a thorough drilling of a subject on intimate details about their lives, is among Scientology's most powerful tools for retaining control over its members according to HuffPost . The church's efforts came together just as they had in Cruise's relationship with Rogers; he filed for divorce in 2001.

He and Nicole Kidman lost a child

After filing for divorce from Nicole Kidman, Tom Cruise insisted to Vanity Fair (via E! News ), "She knows why, and I know why." But according to Andrew Morton's " Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography ," Cruise's request – delivered by a third party – was a shocking turn for his wife. She tried to enter marriage counseling, as offered by the Church of Scientology according to Lawrence Wright's " Going Clear, " but Cruise was not receptive. Complicating matters for Kidman was her learning that she was pregnant with the child of the man so coldly leaving her.

Early on in their marriage, according to Kidman in a Marie Claire interview, she and Cruise were expecting. But it was an ectopic pregnancy, a condition where the fertilized egg attaches outside the uterus. It was a devastating experience for Kidman, and per Morton , doctors suggested that the couple should avoid trying for another baby. Years later, at the end of her relationship with Cruise, Kidman miscarried. Cruise, writes Morton , "sent flowers but did not visit her at the hospital."

Anger and trauma have disrupted his relationships

Divorce and childhood trauma can breed deep unhappiness in people, affecting their ability to emote and connect. Eileen Berlin, Tom Cruise's first personal manager from 1980 to 1983, suspects that to be true of her former client. In an interview with the Daily Mail in 2012, she remembered the Cruise she first met as an explosive young man. Though he could be, in her words, "sweet, respectful, and mannerly to a fault," Cruise was also prone to flying off the handle. As innocuous a gift as a photo album with clippings from fan magazines could set him off.

Cruise's anger didn't always come out fast and hot. Sometimes he made constructive use of it, as in his early role in "Taps." At other times, it manifested as a wall of resistance. "He was so private," said Berlin. "He couldn't show his true feelings. You would get so far and he would close down." For Berlin, who put Cruise up in her apartment for several months in 1980, the most obvious source of this reserve and her client's mood swings was lingering resentment toward his father. It was the same issue, says Berlin, that opened Cruise up to the overtures of Scientology.

His estrangement from his youngest daughter

During their 10-year marriage, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman adopted two children, according to The Daily Beast : Isabella and Connor. After Cruise's divorce from her, Kidman was marked by the Church of Scientology as a "Suppressive Person," those the church regards as antisocial personalities standing in the way of members' spiritual development. Such persons are to be avoided, or "disconnected" from. Not only did Cruise disconnect from his former wife, but his children (who have since been raised as Scientologists) were subjected to "reeducation" to see their mother in that light. For her part, Kidman told the Sun in 2019 that she and her children with Cruise were re-connecting.

Years later, after Cruise's brief and well-publicized marriage to Katie Holmes ended in a filing for divorce by Holmes that caught her husband off-guard, the shoe was on the other foot. In another article for The Daily Beast , Amy Zimmerman reports it was fear of Scientology's potential influence over their daughter, Suri , that helped motivate Holmes to leave Cruise. It was a fact he was reluctant to say aloud during legal proceedings, but he eventually had to concede the point. And despite his claims to the contrary, entertainment reporters suggest that Cruise has often been absent from Suri's life since the divorce.

Why Tom Cruise Changed His Name When He Got To Hollywood

Tom Cruise is one of the most prominent actors in the world. His films, including "Top Gun" and the "Mission: Impossible" series, have made him a bankable star in Hollywood. That said, Cruise is worth even more than you probably realized , with a staggering net worth of $600 million. Variety reported that Cruise made $100 million alone from his 2022 hit film "Top Gun: Maverick."

Fame and fortune aside, Cruise is also known for his doomed marriages to fellow actors Nicole Kidman and Katie Holmes. Born in 1962, acting was not Cruise's first career choice. As a young teen, Cruise was studying for a surprising job as a Catholic priest. However, after starring in the play "Guys and Dolls" in high school, Cruise was bitten by the acting bug. By the time he was 19, he had signed with an agent. He subsequently nabbed a role in the 1981 film "Endless Love" and later gained notoriety with 1983's "Risky Business," which critics now consider to be a cult classic. A string of successful movies followed, including "Top Gun" and "Rain Man."

But, before he was an A-lister, Cruise went by a longer moniker: His birth name is Thomas Cruise Mapother IV. Early on in his career, he shortened his name. The reason for this? His father was "a merchant of chaos" who would bully his kids, the actor once said (via Gentleman's Journal ), though Cruise apparently dropped the Mapother name for commercial reasons as well as personal ones.

Tom Cruise's dad was abusive

According to People , an agent suggested that Thomas Cruise Mapother IV change his name to Tom Cruise. Of course, this is nothing new in the entertainment industry. Several stars, including Whoopi Goldberg, Marilyn Monroe, and countless others changed or modified their name before making it big in Hollywood. However, Gentleman's Journal writes that Cruise also decided against using the last name Mapother because he wanted to symbolically cut ties with his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III.

Per CBS News , Cruise, who is notoriously private, revealed in a 2006 interview with Parade magazine that his father was abusive to him while he was growing up. Cruise told the publication that his father "was a bully and a coward... the kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you. It was a great lesson in my life — how he'd lull you in, make you feel safe, and then, bang!" Cruise's mother, Mary Lee South, divorced him in 1974. Cruise did not see his father again until 1984. By that point, the elder Mapother was on his deathbed.

Cruise explained to Parade that even as he was dying of cancer, his father did not want to discuss "the past." He said, "When I saw him in pain, I thought, 'What a lonely life.' He was in his late 40s. It was sad."

If you or someone you know may be the victim of child abuse, please contact the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child (1-800-422-4453) or contact their live chat services .

Tom Cruise's actor cousin kept his last name

Tom Cruise may have had a fractured relationship with his father, but he's not the only celebrity in the Mapother family. His cousin, William Mapother (pictured above), is also an actor. Unlike Cruise, William professionally uses the surname he was born with. He is best known for starring in the 2001 film "In the Bedroom" opposite Marissa Tomei and Sissy Spacek, as well as the hit J.J. Abrams series "Lost," in which he played Dr. Ethan. He has also worked on several of Cruise's films. These include "Born on the Fourth of July" (which was Mapother's first movie), "Magnolia," "Mission: Impossible II," "Vanilla Sky," and "Minority Report."

William prefers to keep a low-key profile and doesn't like discussing his family. In an interview with HuffPost , he was asked what it was like to have Cruise as a cousin. He replied, "That's one question I'm not going to answer — I don't mind you asking — only because whenever I answer questions about my cousin, it ends up getting spun and misinterpreted. Not by you guys, because I know you'll present exactly what I say, but someone else will take out pieces and you know... It's happened too often." He did say that they are "very close" and that Cruise is "a great guy," but he wouldn't be drawn any further on the matter.

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7 things you never knew about Tom Cruise’s fascinating Irish heritage

BY: Jack Beresford July 03, 2020

TOM CRUISE is about as all-American as it gets, right? Wrong!

The Mission Impossible actor is actually a lot more Irish than most people probably realise.

And it’ that same Irish heritage that has helped Cruise carve out a career as one of the biggest film stars on the planet.

Don’t believe us? Here are just a few of his links to the Emerald Isle.

1. Cruise's Irish ancestry dates back over 800 years.

Born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, the Risky Business star is directly descended from the Cruise family, who first appeared in Ireland in the twelfth century.

2. A direct descendant of his invaded Ireland

A Cruise was among the knights who took part in the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland. Augustino de Cruce, helped conquer large swaths of land from the Irish under the leadership of Earl of Pembroke, Richard ‘Strongbow’ de Clare.

3. Cruise's family were gifted land around Dublin

Several important Norse-Irish towns were seized during the invasion, including what we now know as Dublin, Waterford and Wexford.

The Cruises were granted land in north Dublin for their efforts and established themselves in the area, remaining there for many generations.

4. The Cruises clashed with Oliver Cromwell

The Cruises were one of several old English families who refused to conform to the Protestant faith and lost their lands in Ireland when they rebelled against Oliver Cromwell.

Another was the Russells with the two families eventually bound together by marriage in 1766, as the Russell Cruises.

5. The Cruises emigrated to Ireland in the 19th century

In 1825, Tom Cruise’s great-great-great grandfather Patrick Russell Cruise married Teresa Johnson, emigrating to the US a year later.

He eventually returned to Ireland after learning his land agent had forced several families out of farms on land he owned in Co Westmeath in 1843.

Russell Cruise subsequently restored tenants to 500 acres around the townlands in Paristown and Dardistown in the years running up to the Great Famine when potato crops repeatedly failed.

Remembered for his compassion for farmers on his land, he died in Dublin in 1849 having never returned to America.

6. Cruise's family has several ties to Ireland

The youngest known child of Patrick Russell Cruise, Mary Paulina Russell Cruise, was born in New Jersey in 1832.

She subsequently married Dillon Henry Mapother, an engineer from Dublin with family links to Co Roscommon, in 1858 and had several children before his death in 1874.

At the time of her first husband’s death Mary Pauline Mapother (nee Russell Cruise) was in her early 40s, with a large family to support. Within two years she remarried to Thomas O’Mara, a Wholesale Druggist, born in Kentucky of Irish parents.

7. Tom Cruise's surname should actually be O'Mara

This second marriage produced one child – Thomas O’Mara jr. Who was born 29th December 1876, when his mother was 44. He is the great-grandfather of the actor Tom Cruise.

Following his father’s death, before 1900, Thomas O’Mara Jr. assumed the name Thomas Cruise Mapother with experts theorising that Mary Pauline encouraged him to do so, knowing knew that her children by her first husband were due a family inheritance, from the eventual sale of the Mapother estate in Ireland on the failure of male heirs.

By the late 19 th Century the Mapother estate amounted to 1,777 acres.

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‘Warm, charismatic woman’: Tom Cruise’s mother, who inspired him to act, dead at 80

Like many teenagers, Thomas Cruise Mapother IV was lost.

Throughout a tumultuous childhood, which included moving cities several times and an estranged father, sports provided a natural outlet for his pent-up anger, confusion and fear. Then a knee injury in the winter of his senior year of high school ended his burgeoning wrestling career.

That’s when, as People noted , his mom, Mary Lee South, suggested he try out for his Glen Ridge, N.J., high school’s production of “Guys and Dolls.” Heeding his mother’s wisdom, he auditioned and was cast as Nathan Detroit, one of the musical’s major characters.

Weeks later, he had just finished bowing after his first, exhilarating performance. Still warm from bathing in the spotlight, the teenager rushed to his mom and stepfather.

Ex-Scientologists tell disturbing stories about David Miscavige, the ‘pope of Scientology,’ on A&E series

“After the show,” South told Rolling Stone in 1986, “Tom came home and said he wanted to have a talk with my husband and me. He asked for ten years to give show business a try. … And we both wholeheartedly agreed, because we both felt it was a God-given talent, and he should explore it because he was so enthused about it. So to make a long story short, we gave him our blessing — and the rest is history.”

That history, of course, consisted of Mapother’s move to Hollywood, where he shortened his name to Tom Cruise and became one of the silver screen’s most famous stars. Through all that, he remained close to his mother. He often brought her to movie premieres, and in 2001 The Washington Post’s Reliable Source noted that the two were seen dining at Old Ebbit Grill.

“My mother is a very warm, charismatic woman. Very kind, very generous,” Cruise once told interviewer James Lipton.

South died in her sleep last week, People reported Monday. She was 80 years old.

The weird thing Tom Cruise does during interviews, and other revelations from a celebrity reporter

While that first production was important in Cruise’s development as an actor, perhaps the most important thing he gained from his mother was his tireless work ethic and the virtue of patience. He was 11 years old when his parents divorced, and he wouldn’t see his father again for 10 years, as he told Lipton. Cruise, not yet a teenager, began working to support his mom and three sisters.

“No job was too dirty or difficult for Tommy, as long as it paid money to help his mom out,” neighbor Bill Lewis told Andrew Morton, the author of Cruise’s unauthorized biography .

Meanwhile, his mother took on three part-time jobs, eventually slipping a disk in her back from the stress. “My mom could have sat there every morning and cried and cried,” Cruise said, according to Lewis. “She didn’t. My mom was very proud. She had dignity. She’s going to work hard.”

The family still required federal food stamps to ensure everyone remained fed, certainly a far cry from the dreams of a younger South.

“I was always interested in theater, but I never did anything with it,” South told Rolling Stone. “When I was growing up, if you went to Hollywood, that was really risque. I would have lost my religion, my morals, all those things that young girls thought of back then.”

Cruise seemed to reflect his mother’s interests. “He used to create skits and imitate Donald Duck and Woody Woodpecker and W.C. Fields when he was just a tiny tot. I guess I was his greatest audience,” she said. But he mostly lacked the time to pursue them. He spent the time not dedicated to work and sports with his mother.

“Every night I’d come home, bathe my feet and sit in the family room, and Tom would massage my feet for a half-hour,” South told Rolling Stone. “This went on for six weeks, then Easter came and went, and the Monday after Easter I came home from work expecting the same treatment. And he said, ‘Hey Mom — Lent’s over.'”

Since skyrocketing to fame, Cruise paid his mother back in spades for her sacrifices. As inTouch reported in 2008, he often housed South, his sister Cass and her two children. “He’s very close with his sisters and his mother and he always welcomes his family into his house,” an unnamed source told the magazine.

As for South, she clearly loved seeing her son shine. Thinking back to that first performance, she told Rolling Stone, “I can’t describe the feeling that was there. It was just an incredible experience to see what we felt was a lot of talent coming forth all of a sudden. It had been dormant for so many years — not thought of or talked about or discussed in any way.”

A service, attended by Cruise and his three sisters, was held for South this weekend at her local Church of Scientology.

Why Did Tom Cruise Change His Name?

Over the last 40 years, Tom Cruise's name has been prominently featured in the center of billboards and posters for classic films like " Mission Impossible ," "Interview with the Vampire," and "Top Gun." Perhaps, in an alternate universe, a slightly longer name would have been displayed, as Cruise's birth certificate actually reads Thomas Cruise Mapother IV. It's been reported that the "Rain Man" star's talent agent urged him to be credited as Tom Cruise for his projects, presumably due to the name's undeniable catchiness. The agent may have also correctly surmised that Cruise enjoys stunt work, specifically cruising on fast-moving vehicles.

While it does not seem to have been confirmed by the actor, Cruise may have also amended his surname because he is the namesake of his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III. Cruise stated he harbored resentment toward his father and alleged he inflicted abuse in a 2006 Parade interview. "He was a bully and a coward. He was the kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you. It was a great lesson in my life—how he'd lull you in, make you feel safe and then, bang! For me, it was like, 'There's something wrong with this guy. Don't trust him. Be careful around him,'" stated the star.

Cruise also shared that his late mother, Mary Lee Pfeiffer, eventually fled from her then-husband. "My mother finally had the courage to stand up to my dad and go, 'No more! I'm not taking it. So long,'" stated the actor.

Tom Cruise spoke to his father before his death

During the Parade magazine interview, Tom Cruise stated he agreed to have a face-to-face conversation with Thomas Cruise Mapother III in his early 20s after he discovered he had been hospitalized for terminal cancer. The "Top Gun" star shared he found the situation upsetting despite his decade-long estrangement from his father. "When I saw him in pain, I thought, 'Wow, what a lonely life.' He was in his late 40s. It was sad," shared the actor.

In a 2004 " Inside the Actors Studio " interview, Cruise revealed he gifted his dad a figure in the likeness of Mark Twain's beloved character Tom Sawyer. "It had the music from 'The Sting' on it ... because he and I, we loved that movie. We saw that movie together. I gave him that as a gift, and he laughed," shared Cruise.

While speaking to Barbara Walters in 1992, Cruise stated that his father asserted that he wanted to get to know him better after his hospital visit. "He said, 'Look, when I get out of here, we'll go out and we'll have a beer. And we'll talk about everything.' And then he died," he related.

While the exact reason for the actor's choice of Hollywood name is unclear, it's difficult to deny that the name Tom Cruise makes a big impact when the credits are rolling.

Tom Cruise Is Intensely Private, But Here's What We Know About His Personal Life

Tom Cruise is truly larger than life (though a little below average in stature ) even by Hollywood standards. Any movie he stars in is virtually guaranteed to be a box office hit if not smash. In fact, taking in all box office numbers, foreign and domestic, you have to go back to the 1980s to find a movie that truly bombed.

Incredibly, Tom Cruise has made 18 films that have earned north of $100 million. The numbers are staggering, but what about the man behind the numbers? Let’s take a look, shall we?

How Tall Is Tom Cruise?

Tom Cruise is often called out for being short, and while he’s not tall, he’s also not the shortest guy in Hollywood either. At 5’7" in height, he’s taller than a lot of famous actors, like Daniel Radcliffe (5’5”), Michael J. Fox (5’4”), Scott Caan (5’5”), and Richard Dreyfuss (5’5”).

How Old Is Tom Cruise?

Tom Cruise was not born on the 4th of July, but he was born on the 3rd of July in Syracuse, NY in 1962, making him 56-years-old at the time of this writing. He's pretty fit for someone pushing sixty, too, and regularly still has shirtless scenes in movies.

Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman in Eyes Wide Shut

Who Is Tom Cruise’s Wife?

Tom Cruise has been married three times. His first marriage was to Mimi Rogers, who introduced him to the Church of Scientology. They were married from 1987 to 1990 when he left her after meeting the woman that would become his second wife, Nicole Kidman .

Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman got married in 1990 after meeting on the set of Day Of Thunder . They stayed married through the '90s, but eventually divorced in 2001. Kidman is now married to fellow Aussie Keith Urban.

After Tom and Nicole divorced, he began dating his Vanilla Sky co-star, Penelope Cruz (Cruise and Cruz), before breaking up with her in 2004, and shortly after, he began dating his soon-to-be third wife, Katie Holmes .

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Sixteen years his junior, Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise stayed married for six years before Holmes filed for divorce in New York State. Their relationship was often splashed on the covers of the tabloids, sometimes because of Cruise’s involvement in the Church of Scientology or sometimes because he was jumping up and down on couches with Oprah .

It's worth noting that before Tom Cruise married Mimi Rogers in the '80s, he was linked to a number of actress, all older than the young Hollywood heartthrob was at the time. He dated his Risky Business co-star Rebecca De Mornay briefly. He had a relationship with Bruce Springsteen ’s now-wife Patti Scialfa (before she and The Boss got together) and he also was linked to Cher for a short time, who was 16 years his elder.

Is Tom Cruise A Scientologist?

He is. Tom Cruise is almost as famous for being a Scientologist as he is for his movies. The two adopted children from his marriage to Nicole Kidman are as well .

He first joined the Church in the mid-eighties and has since become a strong advocate on behalf of it. The leader of the church, David Miscavige, was the best man at Cruise’s wedding to Katie Holmes and Cruise has spoken publicly often about his faith in Scientology. Tom Cruise is such an important part of the Church, Miscavige invented an award to give him , called the Freedom Medal Of Valor.

In 2008, a video of an interview with Tom Cruise that was intended to be for Church use was leaked to the internet. In the video -- which was edited to have the Mission: Impossible theme playing under his talking -- the actor makes a lot of wild statements that the Church claimed were taken out of context and they sued YouTube and others to have the video removed. YouTube eventually removed it, but it can be found on the internet still.

Before he started acting as a young man, Tom Cruise also briefly attended Seminary hoping to become a Catholic priest, but the acting bug caught and he left for Hollywood.

What Is Tom Cruise’s Real Name?

When he was born, Tom Cruise was named Thomas Cruise Mapother IV. He was named after his father, who Cruise didn’t not get along with growing up. When Cruise was in 6th grade, while living in Ottawa, Canada, his mother divorced his father and moved back to The States. Later, she remarried when Cruise was 16. Thomas Cruise Mapother III died when Tom Cruise was 22, just as Cruise really broke big in Hollywood.

A cousin on his father’s side is actor William Mapother, who starred as Ethan on Lost and has appeared in three films with Cruise himself, Born On The Fourth Of July, Mission: Impossible 2 , and Minority Report.

Does Tom Cruise Have Kids?

Yep. Tom Cruise has three kids. Two were adopted during his marriage to Nicole Kidman. Allegedly, Nicole Kidman was pregnant when he filed for divorce in 2000, but tragically she miscarried. She also reportedly had a miscarriage early in their marriage as well.

Six years later, in 2006, his then-girlfriend Katie Holmes famously gave birth to their daughter Suri. The tabloids and gossip sites went crazy and the world buzzed with the announcement. Vanity Fair published the first pictures of their baby and circulation reportedly jumped 60% for the issue. It was a BIG deal. More recently, the news hasn't been as good though, as it's been reported that Tom Cruise doesn't have much contact, if any, with Suri.

What Are Tom Cruise’s Kids’ Names?

His two adopted children with Nicole Kidman are, Isabella Jane Cruise, both in 1992 and Connor Anthony Cruise, born in 1995. The most famous of his children though, is the one he had with Katie Holmes , whose name is Suri.

Why Did Tom Cruise Get Divorced?

As noted prior, his first marriage ended in divorce to Mimi Rogers because he met and started dating Nicole Kidman.

Neither Nicole Kidman nor Tom Cruise have ever spoken publicly very much about their divorce in 2001. All that is really known is that it was Cruise that filed for divorce, using the nebulous “irreconcilable differences” reason in California.

Like his divorce from Kidman, Cruise has never talked much about his divorce from Katie Holmes, nor has she . Holmes filed for divorce in New York State, which has very strict privacy laws when it comes to divorce and custody, so everything is speculation, really.

So, those are the public details of Tom Cruise’s private life. As someone who has been on the front page of newspapers for almost 40 years, surprisingly little is really known about him. He’s a huge name, but an intensely private person.

Of course, there have been times where the absolute opposite of all of that is true, like when his daughter Suri was born in 2006.

One thing is still for sure – he is still box office platinum . He is one of the rare few actors in Hollywood that basically guarantees a huge box office number. That probably won’t change in anytime soon with the releases of the Top Gun sequel Maverick in 2020 and then two more Mission: Impossible movies in 2021 and 2022.

Hugh Scott is the Syndication Editor for CinemaBlend. Before CinemaBlend, he was the managing editor for Suggest.com and Gossipcop.com, covering celebrity news and debunking false gossip. He has been in the publishing industry for almost two decades, covering pop culture – movies and TV shows, especially – with a keen interest and love for Gen X culture, the older influences on it, and what it has since inspired. He graduated from Boston University with a degree in Political Science but cured himself of the desire to be a politician almost immediately after graduation.

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Historical records matching Thomas Cruise Mapother, II

Thomas C Mapother

Collection: 1910 United States Federal Census
Birth: Circa 1908 - Kentucky, United States
Residence: 1910 - Louisville Ward 3, Jefferson, Kentucky, USA
Parents: Thomas C Mapother, Anna B Mapother

Thomas Mapother, Jr

Collection: 1930 United States Federal Census
Residence: 1930 - Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, USA
Sibling: Paul Mapother

Collection: 1920 United States Federal Census
Residence: 1920 - Jefferson, Kentucky, USA
Parents: Thomas Mapother, Anna Mapother

Collection: Kentucky Deaths, 1900 - 1999
Birth: Circa 1908
Death: Jan 17 1986 - Jefferson, Kentucky, USA

Thomas Cruise MAPOTHER

Collection: Filae Family Trees
Birth: 1907
Death: 1986
Parents: Thomas Cruise MAPOTHER, Anna Stewart BATEMAN
Wife: Catherine Louise REIBERT
Son: Thomas Cruise MAPOTHER
Birth: Dec 17 1907
Death: Jan 17 1986
Parents: Thomas Cruise MAPOTHER, Anna Stewart BATMAN

Thomas Cruise Mapother

Collection: FamilySearch Family Tree
Birth: Dec 17 1906
Death: Jan 1986
Parents: Thomas Cruise Mapother, Anna S. Mapother (born Batman)
Wife: Catherine Louise Mapother (born Reibert)
Children: William Reibert Mapother, Thomas Cruise Mapother, Caroline Mapother
Siblings: Paul Mapother, Angela Mapother

St. Xavier High School - 1955

Collection: U.S. Yearbooks, 1890-1979
Text: ... Brother Medard, moderator; Mr. Hugh Ogburn, vice president; Mr. Thomas Mapother , President; and Mrs. Robert Adelberg, Secretary. Organiz...
School location: Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky, United States
Yearbook year: 1955

Thomas Cruise Jr Mapother

Collection: MyHeritage Family Trees
Site name: Dermody Web Site
Site manager: Erin Dermody
Birth: Dec 17 1907 - Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Death: Jan 17 1986 - Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Children: Thomas C Iii Mapother, William Reibert Mapother

Collection: BillionGraves
Burial: Calvary Cemetery, Louisville, Kentucky, United States

Immediate Family

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61 Fascinating Facts About Tom Cruise

1. Thomas Cruise Mapother IV was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, N.Y., to Thomas Cruise Mapother III , an electrical engineer, and Mary Lee Pfeiffer , both of Louisville, Ky. (His grandfather and great-grandfather were both Thomas Cruise Mapother, as well.)

2. He has two older sisters, Lee Anne and Marian , and one younger sister, Catherine , nicknamed Cass.

3. Cruise wanted to act from around the time he was 4 and started doing impressions of everyone from Donald Duck to Humphrey Bogart and Elvis Presley .

4. In 1974, when the family was living in Ottawa, Mary Lee packed up and took the kids back to Louisville. She officially divorced Tom III in August 1975 and, six weeks later, he remarried, briefly. Joan Lebendiger , recently widowed, had four kids, one of whom later told biographer Andrew Morton that they never saw their stepbrother Tom again after the wedding.

"As a kid, I had a lot of hidden anger about that. I'd get hit, and I didn't understand it," Cruise recalled to Vanity Fair in 1994.

"He was the kind of guy who really got picked on a lot at school himself when he was growing up," he said of his father. "He had also been small, though he ended up being six foot two. People had been quite brutal to him. Inside, I believe he was a really sensitive individual." Tom III could also "actually be quite loving."

But in 2006 he told Parade that his dad was "a bully and a coward—the person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you. It was a great lesson in my life, how he'd lull you in, make you feel safe and then, bang!"

Cruise visited his father in the hospital before he died of cancer in 1984 and Tom III said he'd get better and they would "'talk about the whole thing,'" the actor told VF , but that never came to pass.

5. Tom was very close to his mother, whom he described to James Lipton on Inside the Actors Studio as "a very warm, charismatic woman, very kind, very generous." She worked four jobs at any given time to take care of them, and Tom had a paper route to pitch in. "Every night I'd come home, bathe my feet and sit in the family room, and Tom would massage my feet for a half-hour," Mary Lee recalled to Rolling Stone . (She died at 80 in 2017.)

6. He was also protective of his sisters and, as the man of the house, took on the role of scrutinizing their boyfriends when they'd come by to meet the family.

7. Cruise was raised Catholic and he spent his freshman year of high school at St. Francis Seminary in Cincinnati, after a priest named Father Ric Schneider gave a talk at his (also Catholic) school in Louisville. "He was a typical teenager, trying to find his way in life," Schneider told the New York Daily News in 2013. "We would give them an IQ test, and he just about made the cut. The cutoff is 110, and he scored exactly 110."

It's been rumored that Cruise considered entering the priesthood, but he doesn't it remember it that way. "We didn't have the money back then, and I went for the education for a year, and it was free," Cruise has explained.

8. Mary Lee got remarried to Jack South in 1978 and the whole family moved to New Jersey when Tom was 16.

"In the beginning, I felt threatened by my stepfather," Cruise told Rolling Stone . "There's a part of you that's in love with your mother. But he is such a wise, smart man. He loved my mother so much that he took us all in, four young people. We'd bet on football games, and he was a terrible bettor, so I'd make lots of money."

As for his dad, Tom III, who had recently passed away, "I think that he felt remorse for a lot that had happened. He was a person who did not have a huge influence on me in my teens; the values and motivation really came from my stepfather. But he was important. Really important. It's all sort of complex. There wasn't one thing I felt."

9. He was always a daredevil, jumping off things, riding his bike too fast, sometimes into walls and, here and there, breaking bones. In high school he joined the glee club and did plays. He was also an athlete, over the years dabbling in soccer, baseball, basketball, football and ice hockey, and he wrestled. Sports and acting were where he really stood out and, shocker, the ladies have loved him since grammar school.

"I was a wild kid," Cruise admitted. "I'd cut school. Everything had to do with my wanting always to push the envelope to see: where do I stand with myself? How far can I go?"

10. Cruise has been open about his battle with dyslexia, calling himself "a functional illiterate" in school, though he "loved learning. I wanted to learn, but I knew I had failed in the system."

"My energy was always all over the place. Reading was not at the top of my list, because it took me so long," he told Cameron Crowe for Interview in 1986. "When I wrote a paper, my mother would help me with it. I would take a test and get very nervous. I would skip questions and skip lines. I've gotten better. I've learned to control my eyes. I used to have to use my finger all the time. I just wasn't relaxed about it."

11. Senior year of high school he got kicked off the football team after he was caught drinking, according to Morton, but that left him time to audition for the school musical, Guys and Dolls . He played Nathan Detroit, and a commercial director who happened to catch a performance told him he should pursue acting professionally. So, he started going to New York on weekends to audition for musicals—and he missed his graduation ceremony while performing in an amateur production of Godspell .

12. Cruise made his movie debut in the 1981 drama Taps , in a role that was bigger than the one he was originally cast in "because you could see right away that he had a giant talent," former Paramount head Sherry Lansing said in Stephen Galloway 's 2017 biography Leading Lady . "He was always extremely focused and exceptionally polite."

13. On the set of Francis Ford Coppola 's The Outsiders , featuring a veritable who's-who of '80s-era heartthrobs , prankster Cruise scrawled "Helter Skelter" on co-star Diane Lane 's mirror and put honey on her toilet seat.

14. The only direction Cruise received for his iconic Risky Business dance to "Old Time Rock and Roll" was one line in the script: "Joel dances in underwear through the house." He ad-libbed the rest, grabbing the candlestick, "using it as a guitar, jumping on the table. I waxed half the floor and kept the other half dirty, so I could slide in on my socks. As we went along, I threw more stuff in," he shared with Crowe in 1986.

15. Cruise dated his Risky Business co-star Rebecca De Mornay , who called him a "pure person." She told Rolling Stone in 1986, "There's something earnest and virtuous about him that's quite rare." According to Taps co-star Sean Penn , they were out at a club in New York one night and after realizing that a girl he was talking to was trying to pick him up, Cruise "screamed at her, 'I have a girlfriend I'm in love with!'" (Perhaps at the time readers thought Penn might be exaggerating.) He and De Mornay started dating in the summer of 1983 and maintained a long-distance relationship while he shot Ridley Scott 's Legend in London, but broke up when he returned to the U.S. to start making Top Gun .

16. Top Gun producers Jerry Bruckheimer and Don Simpson envisioned no one other than Cruise playing Maverick after they saw a magazine story about the elite flying school at San Diego's Miramar Naval Air Station and went down to see the hot shots in person. "From the first time we went down to Miramar—even before the script was written—we said, 'These guys are Tom Cruises,'" Bruckheimer told Rolling Stone .

17. Although Cruise also told Rolling Stone in 1986 that he wasn't sure he would be able to get married in his "present state of mind," he tied the knot with Mimi Rogers on May 9, 1987, two years after meeting her at a dinner party. Emilio Estevez was Cruise's best man.

18. Paul Newman , his co-star in 1987's The Color of Money , turned him on to race car driving and Cruise has been feeling the need for speed on land and in the air (and sometimes on the water) ever since. Years later the student became the teacher when, in 2010, Cruise taught Zac Efron about motorcycles. "I don't know," Efron told Details when asked why Cruise offered to do that. "I don't even want to know. It's just so cool that he gave a s--t, the fact that he cared at all."

19. Mimi and her first husband, Jim Rogers , were both members of the Church of Scientology (Jim was a high-level auditor) and she's said to have introduced Cruise to the organization, giving him L. Ron Hubbard 's Dianetics and other literature. His immersion in Scientology coincided with the release of Top Gun and the actor becoming one of the biggest stars in the world, and to this day Cruise remains the most famous member of the church.

20. Despite being critically panned, 1988's Cocktail , starring Cruise as a playboy bartender, gave Disney its biggest opening weekend ever at the time: $11.8 million.

21. According to Morton's 2008 biography Tom Cruise , director Oliver Stone wanted Tom to be injected with a chemical that would have rendered him temporarily paralyzed so he could better identify with the role of real-life Vietnam War veteran and activist Ron Kovic in 1989's Born on the Fourth of July . The insurance company understandably shut that idea down. The film still won two Oscars, best editing and best director for Stone, so it worked out.

22. People named Cruise its "Sexiest Man Alive" in 1990. Soon after, he and Rogers divorced. When Vanity Fair asked about his first marriage in 1994, Cruise replied tersely , "It was a long time ago. I really don't think about it."

23. Cruise met Nicole Kidman during casting for the racing drama Days of Thunder and they tied the knot on Dec. 24, 1990. They adopted two children, Isabella and Connor , and starred in two more movies together, Far and Away and Eyes Wide Shut .

After Isabella arrived, Cruise told Vanity Fair in 1994 , "We talked about children from time to time, but there was always the work. But then we went, When is it ever going to be the right time? That's how the conversation started. You're lying in bed at night and you're trying to sleep, so you roll over and you go, What would happen if we had this in our life?

"One of the things that Nic and I talk about is that now suddenly we're a family. We're at that point where we're trying to define where we are. Can we still party? Are we really boring? Oh, my God . . . we're old!"

24. Disney had Cruise in mind when they created the look of the title character in 1992's Aladdin . "There's a confidence with all of his attitudes and his poses," lead animator Glen Keane said in a DVD extras feature.

25. An old tabloid go-to back in the 1980s and '90s was to claim that this or that star was gay, and Cruise was aware that the rumor was out there.

"First of all, I don't think it's an indictment," Cruise told Vanity Fair in 1994. "But I hadn't heard those rumors till about three months ago myself… I don't know why they say it. I've heard everything from I've cheated on my wife to my wife was there on the set of The Firm because she was pissed off about my love scene on the beach. It's not true, but people are going to say what they want to say."

26. Cruise wanted Brian De Palma to direct Mission: Impossible , which would mark his debut as a producer with his agent turned partner Paula Wagner , even though De Palma was in movie jail following several flops. Cruise even deferred his $20 million salary (not including his back-end deal) so they could raise the movie's budget. Mission accomplished: M:I made almost $500 million worldwide and spawned a franchise . De Palma, however, didn't attend the film's premiere in May 1996, reportedly because he and Cruise didn't always see eye to eye during production.

27. Shooting M:I , Cruise insisted they use a fan big enough to create the 120 mile-per-hour wind he'd be facing if he was really clinging to a bullet train while a helicopter exploded behind him. A crew member told Galloway, "He said, 'I want the wind blowing in my face and I want my jaws to be blowing.' That's Tom. He's a guy's guy."

28. The intense Eyes Wide Shut shoot was scheduled to last four months but ended up keeping Tom and Nicole in London for 18 months. Also during their time in England, as fate would have it, they attended Princess Diana 's funeral in September 1997, as did with Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg , who were in town making Saving Private Ryan .

29. "All I can say is that I hope we are together when we are 80," Nicole Kidman told Talk in 2000. "I can't say we will be, but I will be so devastated if we are not." Alas, they announced their separation on Feb. 5, 2001. "She knows why, and I know why," Cruise cryptically told Vanity Fair later that year. "She's the mother of my children, and I wish her well. And I think that you just move on. And I don't say that lightly. I don't say that with anything."

30. Penélope Cruz successfully sued an Australian tabloid in June 2003, winning damages and a retraction over a story claiming she and then-boyfriend Cruise had postponed their impending marriage because she had cheated on him. They broke up in January 2004 after more than two years of dating, a source telling People the relationship "just ran its course."

31. The Church of Scientology denied a 2012 Vanity Fair report that Homeland actress Nazanin Boniadi , then a church member, had basically been recruited to date Cruise for a few months, starting in October 2004 with a group outing that included renting the skating rink at Rockefeller Center and dinner at Nobu. "I'd rather not talk about that," Boniadi told the New York Post in 2013.

32. Cruise specifically held out for J.J. Abrams to direct Mission: Impossible III —Abrams' feature film debut—after watching some episodes of Alias . Paramount was freaking out, wanting M:I3 for a summer 2005 tentpole release, which wasn't going to happen if Cruise and Abrams—busy at the moment with a show called Lost —got their way, but it turned out Cruise had an ace up his sleeve. Spielberg was ready to roll with War of the Worlds in time to give Paramount the summer blockbuster it needed while they waited for Abrams to become available.

33. On May 23, 2005, a giddy Cruise raised his arms in victory, got down on one knee and did a couple of fist pumps, and then jumped up on Oprah Winfrey 's couch (also twice), fueled by love for his new girlfriend, Katie Holmes . "You're gone," the talk show host observed.

"I've got so much energy, I can't help it," Cruise said.

They were both laughing hysterically and the studio audience was cheering, but… maybe you had to be there?

Lest anyone forget, Holmes was at the taping and Winfrey led a chant for her to come out. "She's gonna run!" Cruise exclaimed. "She is freaking out ." Then he took off for backstage to go get her, the camera trailing him, and once they had emerged Cruise enveloped the Dawson's Creek star in a hug.

That moment unwittingly set the tone for Cruise and Holmes' entire relationship, romantic to many but to everyone… just a lot .

34. A month later, Cruise accused Matt Lauer of being "glib" when the Today host questioned his take on mental health care—specifically, his dismissal of psychiatry and his criticism of Brooke Shields ' "irresponsible" use of medication to treat postpartum depression.

35. Cruise and Holmes' daughter, Suri Cruise , was born on April 18, 2006.

36. Mission: Impossible III came out on May 5, 2006, and did… fine. It was (and remains) the lowest-grossing installment of the franchise, making $134 million domestically, but more memorably it marked the moment where folks started wondering if Cruise had lost his movie-star mojo, if his unadulterated zeal had turned off audiences for good. Not making it better: Paramount severed its 14-year relationship with Cruise's production company that August, and then-Viacom Chairman Sumner Redstone actually told the Wall Street Journal , "We don't think that someone who effectuates creative suicide and costs the company revenue should be on the lot. His recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount."

37. Suri was introduced to the world on the September 2006 cover of Vanity Fair , zipped up in her father's leather jacket akin to how Paul McCartney snuggled daughter Mary on the cover of his 1970 solo album McCartney . The first glimpse at the cover was a huge get for Katie Couric 's first night as lead anchor of the CBS Evening News .

38. Cruise and Holmes' wedding at the 15th-century Castello Orsini-Odescalchi in Rome on Nov. 18, 2016, reportedly cost upward of $3 million . Guest Giorgio Armani designed the bride's ceremony and reception dresses and attendees included Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith , John Travolta and Kelly Preston , David and Victoria Beckham , Jim Carrey and Jenny McCarthy , Leah Remini and Angelo Pagan , and Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony . Andrea Bocelli performed.

39. Church of Scientology leader David Miscavige was Cruise's best man. According to Remini, who left the church in 2013, a traditional Scientology wedding ceremony includes the vow "to never close their eyes in sleep on a disagreement or an upset."

40. Shields and husband Chris Henchy were also in attendance, Cruise having apologized for publicly disparaging his Endless Love co-star's use of medication to treat postpartum depression. "If you get invited to that wedding, you go," Shields recalled on The Jenny McCarthy Show in 2016. The actress even provided the bride's "something old": an antique enamel compact.

41. 2010's Knight and Day with Cameron Diaz was widely treated as some sort of "comeback" movie for Cruise, a test to see if he could still have a monster action movie hit after Mission: Impossible III underwhelmed.

"I don't understand why people think that," he marveled to the U.K.'s Telegraph . "I've been working the whole time."

42. His roles in the interim had included his unrecognizable—and hilarious—surprise turn as crass, bullying, bald and fat studio exec Les Grossman in Ben Stiller 's Tropic Thunder , for which he earned a Golden Globe nomination.

"I had about a dozen people making the silicone prosthetics for his head, neck, chest, and hands," makeup designer Barney Burman recalled to Grantland . "We made him special gloves. I did the sculpting, someone else did the molds, someone else was casting them. I had six different people punching hairs into the scalp piece, so his entire head was one-at-a-time, hand-punched hairs; his arms were hand-punched one at a time; his chest was hand-punched."

Added Aida Caefer , "I made the fat suits for Tom Cruise. He was all for the more ridiculous, the better . The suit went from his neck all the way down to his ankles…The character moved around a lot and he was so soaked in sweat that we had rotating suits for him—one in the morning and one after lunch."

"Tom choreographed all his own moves," Stiller said. "I remember watching him do this stuff and thinking this is so frigging funny."

43. The rumor that Cruise turned down the role of Iron Man, which would have changed the whole vibe of the Marvel Universe, is not true, he says. "Not close," he told ComicBook.com in 2018 when asked if he was really almost Tony Stark. "Not close, and I love Robert Downey Jr. I can't imagine anyone else in that role, and I think it's perfect for him."

44. For 2011's Mission: Impossible—Ghost Protocol , Cruise hung off the edge of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai—the world's tallest building—without a double (though with the appropriate wires). And while he'd been doing as much of his own physical laboring as possible for decades, this reinvigorated Cruise's reputation as the guy who does all the death-defying stunts the insurance companies will allow. The film's $695 million worldwide box office also signaled that Cruise's reputation had preceded him—in a good way.

45. Holmes filed for divorce in June 2012. Her father, attorney Martin Holmes , had helped draft their prenuptial agreement and all was remarkably settled within weeks. And neither of them have ever talked about what happened . They've acknowledged that they were once married to each other, but why it ended has remained anyone's guess. And, oh, how the people have guessed.

46. Eyebrows were raised when the 5-foot-7 Cruise was tapped to play 6-foot-5 vigilante Jack Reacher from Lee Childs ' best-selling novel series.

"Size in my books is a metaphor for an unstoppable force," Childs explained. "Cruise portrays that in his own way."

47. Not as initially OK with the creative license was Interview With the Vampire author Ann Rice , who according to Vanity Fair was livid in the early '90s when Cruise was cast to play Lestat, having written the character with Rutger Hauer in mind.

"It always helps if one is controversial in casting a movie," director Neil Jordan said. "I just thought that if Tom was willing to go the distance this character demands—and he was—then we could end up with something quite extraordinary, and we did."

48. Mission: Impossible—Rogue Nation was legendary before it hit theaters in 2015 for Cruise's viral airplane stunt, in which he hung onto the door of an Airbus A400M as it took off. For real. He also did his own motorcycle chase and learned how to hold his breath for six and a half minutes for the underwater document swap.

49. He was back on the bike for Mission: Impossible—Fallout and "when the [safety] rigs didn't work, we just went for it," director Christopher McQuarrie told the New York Times . "Everything that you're seeing Tom doing, he's doing free riding on cold cobblestones. Sometimes there was rain; sometimes there was morning dew. There was always a danger of skidding and wiping out."

Cruise also did his own skydiving along with Henry Cavill 's stunt double, dangled from a rope attached to a flying helicopter, and piloted a helicopter for a mid-air chase scene, getting his certification in six weeks. It normally takes three months, McQuarrie said, but Cruise trained for 16 hours a day to cut the time in half.

"Tom was having the time of his life," the director said.

50. Cruise has social media accounts but they are strictly for un-risky business, and he prefers to not know everything that's happening online. "Sometimes I have to for work, but I keep it very limited," he told E! News in 2016. "I don't spend time doing that kind of stuff."

51. Cruise isn't one to let himself go in between physically taxing roles. "Sea-kayaking, caving, fencing, treadmill, weights, rock-climbing, hiking… I jog… I do so many different activities," he has said.

In fact, he refers to his personal workout space—a version of which he takes with him everywhere—as the "Pain Cave."

"Only the motivated can enter," he explained to the AP at the 2017 premiere of The Mummy . "All you got to do is just be motivated. Anyone can come in, we have the crew come in, and we just make it available to everyone."

As co-star Jake Johnson revealed: "You start every morning with the daily challenge. So before work starts, you're in there. His hair and makeup team is in there, his crew is in there, so there's about 15, 20 people every day doing their squats and jumping jacks. And then I kinda got into it with him…I wanted to be in a Tom Cruise movie and do it the Tom Cruise way."

That includes, alas, avoiding sugar.

"I love sugar," Cruise assured James Corden on The Late Late Show in 2018, "but I can't eat it because when I'm training, I'm doing all these movies—so I send it to everyone." And then, "I wait for the calls. Like, 'tell me about it.'"

52. Don't tell anyone, but Cruise is human: Aside from what he did to himself running around in childhood, he threw out his back making Legend ; developed an ulcer while shooting Eyes Wide Shut ; tore his labrum scaling a cliff at Dead Horse Point, Utah, for Mission: Impossible 2 ; and broke an ankle on Mission: Impossible—Fallout .

"It was the easy one where I'm running and I jump from one building to the next," Cruise later described the fateful stunt on The Tonight Show .

53. But this guy commits . In addition to doing three months of helicopter pilot training in six weeks and learning how to hold his breath like he's David Blaine , he played pool for 12 hours a day to play Fast Eddie Felson's protegee in The Color of Money. He lost 18 pounds and read classic books out loud to work on his diction to play centuries-old Lestat in Interview With the Vampire. He learned German to better embody a World War II-era officer in Valkyrie . He actually spent a year and a half learning how to fly a helicopter for Mission: Impossible—Fallout (before his whirlwind certification).

54. "I haven't seen him in awhile, but he has sent me a birthday gift every year since I was 11 years old," Dakota Fanning said on Watch What Happens Live in 2016 about her dad in 2005's War of the Worlds . "Beautiful gifts, it's really kind. I always think, 'Oh, when I'm 18, he'll probably stop. Oh, 21, he'll stop. But every year."

What does Team Cruise pick out? "It's usually shoes," the actress, then 22, shared.

55. In 1986, he told Cameron Crowe , "Let's face it, I'm not saving lives here. I feel fortunate, but this is just one aspect of my life. I love my work, but my family is very important to me, too. You pick up the paper and see that there are many things happening outside my little world."

Since then, the real-life heroics include, all within a few years in the '90s: He lifted two boys over a barricade to prevent them being crushed at the Mission: Impossible premiere in London; he sent his own yacht's skiff to rescue a family whose sailboat was on fire in the Mediterranean in 1996; he rushed to the aid of a woman who had been mugged in London; and he paid the $7,000 emergency room bill for an uninsured cashier who was injured in a hit and run—an accident Cruise witnessed.

"It's just an impulse," Cruise told People in 2000 about his spate of good deeds. "I was never a Boy Scout, so maybe I'm making up for it now."

Or, as he said in the video of an interview for his church that went viral in 2008, "You can't drive past an accident, because as a Scientologist you are the only one who can help"

56. Though he's the most famous face of Scientology, Cruise is incredibly protective of his beliefs and doesn't say too much about it publicly. But in October 2016, he told ITV at the London premiere of Jack Reacher: Never Go Back , "It's something that has helped me incredibly in my life. I've been a Scientologist for over 30 years. It's something that is, you know...without it, I wouldn't be where I am. So, it's a beautiful religion. I'm incredibly proud."

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COMMENTS

Tom Cruise Talks About His Father
In an interview with Parade magazine, the 43-year-old actor looks back on two difficult aspects of his early years: his father and bullies at school. Cruise says his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother ...
Tom Cruise
Thomas Cruise Mapother IV (born July 3, 1962) is an American actor and producer. Regarded as a Hollywood icon, he has received various accolades, including an Honorary Palme d'Or and three Golden Globe Awards, in addition to nominations for four Academy Awards. His films have grossed over $4 billion in North America and over $11.5 billion worldwide, making him one of the highest-grossing box ...
Cruise tells of pain of bullies, abusive father
"He was a bully and a coward," the 43-year-old actor says of his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III. "He was the kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you.
Thomas Cruise Mapother III: How Did Tom Cruise's Father Die?
The Top Gun movie star, Tom Cruise's father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III was killed by cancer. He took his last breath on the 9th of January 1984, in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky, USA. He was at the age of 49 when he died.
Tom Cruise Kept His Family Afloat When His Mother Left His Abusive Father
Cruise's biological father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III, was an electrical engineer. Mapother III, could never hold down a job and kept the family on the move in a restless search for work. At a young age, Cruise and his family relocated to Ottawa, Canada where Cruise lived until the 6th grade. Yet, everywhere Cruise went, his father's abuse ...
Tom Cruise's Irish Ancestry
Tom Cruise's full name is Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, after his father, Thomas Mapother III. The paternal side of his family is Irish, though the Mapother surname has early origins in England. The Mapother name made its first known appearance in Devon several centuries ago, as the family had a seat as Lords of the Manor.
The Tragic Real-Life Story Of Tom Cruise
During perhaps the most controversial period of his career, in the early 2000s, Tom Cruise gave a lengthy interview to Parade about his upbringing. He was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, New York, with the birth name of Thomas Cruise Mapother IV. His father held the same name, one generation back, and his mother was Mary Lee.
Why Tom Cruise Changed His Name When He Got To Hollywood
However, Gentleman's Journal writes that Cruise also decided against using the last name Mapother because he wanted to symbolically cut ties with his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III. Per CBS News, Cruise, who is notoriously private, revealed in a 2006 interview with Parade magazine that his father was abusive to him while he was growing up.
7 things you never knew about Tom Cruise's ...
He is the great-grandfather of the actor Tom Cruise. Following his father's death, before 1900, Thomas O'Mara Jr. assumed the name Thomas Cruise Mapother with experts theorising that Mary Pauline encouraged him to do so, knowing knew that her children by her first husband were due a family inheritance, from the eventual sale of the Mapother ...
Tom Cruise Biography
He was born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV in Syracuse, New York, as the son of Mary Lee and Thomas Cruise Mapother III. His father was an electrical engineer and his mother worked as a special education teacher. He has three sisters. He had a difficult childhood and grew up in near-poverty. His father was an abusive man who often used to beat young ...
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Like many teenagers, Thomas Cruise Mapother IV was lost. Throughout a tumultuous childhood, which included moving cities several times and an estranged father, sports provided a natural outlet for ...
Family tree of Tom CRUISE
Cruise was born in Syracuse, New York, the son of Mary Lee (née Pfeiffer), a special education teacher, and Thomas Cruise Mapother III, an electrical engineer. Although Cruise's paternal surname (Mapother) is Welsh, it appears that his paternal great-grandfather, Thomas O'Mara, was of Irish ancestry and adopted his stepfather's surname, becoming the first Thomas Cruise Mapother.
The Untold Truth Of Tom Cruise
Tom Cruise told Parade (via the Irish Examiner) that his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III was a "bully and coward" and "a merchant of chaos." Cruise added that his father, who was an electrical ...
Why Did Tom Cruise Change His Name?
While it does not seem to have been confirmed by the actor, Cruise may have also amended his surname because he is the namesake of his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III. Cruise stated he harbored ...
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When Cruise was in 6th grade, while living in Ottawa, Canada, his mother divorced his father and moved back to The States. Later, she remarried when Cruise was 16. Thomas Cruise Mapother III died ...
Thomas Cruise Mapother (Cruise), IV
Cruise was born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV on July 3, 1962 in Syracuse, New York to Mary Lee (née Pfeiffer), a special education teacher, and Thomas Cruise Mapother III, an electrical engineer. Cruise's surname originates from his great-grandfather, Thomas Cruise O'Mara, who was adopted by a Welsh immigrant and renamed "Thomas Cruise Mapother".
Thomas Cruise Mapother III (1934-1984)
Father of actor Tom Cruise. He was the husband of Mary Lee Pfeiffer. Father of actor Tom Cruise. Family Members. Parents. ... memorial page for Thomas Cruise Mapother III (15 Oct 1934-9 Jan 1984), Find a Grave Memorial ID 27549862, citing Calvary Cemetery, Louisville ...
Tom Cruise's Mother, Mary Lee South, Dies
Born Mary Lee Pfeiffer, the Louisville, Kentucky, native was a special-education teacher when she wed Cruise's father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III, an electrical engineer. It was from her that ...
Tom Cruise and the 'Bully, Coward' Dad He Always Hated
Tom Cruise and the 'Bully, Coward' Dad He Always Hated. The Hollywood superstar we know as Tom Cruise was born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV on July 3, 1962 in Syracuse, New York. He has three sisters: Lee Anne, Marian and Cass. Cruise's mother Mary Lee taught creative drama, while his father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III, was an electrical ...
Thomas Cruise Mapother, III (1934
Genealogy for Thomas Cruise Mapother, III (1934 - 1984) family tree on Geni, with over 240 million profiles of ancestors and living relatives. People ... father. Catherine Mapother. mother. William Reibert Mapother, Sr. brother. view all Thomas Cruise Mapother, III's Timeline. 1934
Thomas Cruise Mapother, II (1907
Genealogy for Thomas Cruise Mapother, II (1907 - 1986) family tree on Geni, with over 240 million profiles of ancestors and living relatives. People ... I and Anna Stewart Mapother Husband of Catherine Mapother Father of Thomas Cruise Mapother, III and William Reibert Mapother, Sr. Brother of Paul Mapother. Occupation: Lawyer, Judge: Managed by:
61 Fascinating Facts About Tom Cruise
1. Thomas Cruise Mapother IV was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, N.Y., to Thomas Cruise Mapother III, an electrical engineer, and Mary Lee Pfeiffer, both of Louisville, Ky. (His grandfather and ...
Thomas Cruise Mapother Jr. (1907-1986)
Calvary Cemetery. Maintained by: Johnny History. Originally Created by: Elizabeth Reed. Added: Jun 14, 2008. Find a Grave Memorial ID: 27550459. Source citation. He was the husband of Catherine Reibert Mapother and father of Thomas Cruise Mapother III and William Reibert Mapother Sr.