Recent content by Karen#1

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: Former Scientology film director Mitch Brisker has even more photos for us from the church’s movie sets, and this time he’s given us a great narrative about being sandwiched between L. Ron Hubbard's scripts and David Miscavige's mercurial directives. (See his previous...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: We have what we think is a pretty telling video that suggests just how difficult it’s getting to drag Scientologists to their latest fleecing. As former church members tell us all the time, they dreaded going to Scientology events knowing that whatever “good news”...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: Scientology leader David Miscavige revealed the church’s new initiative aimed at kids — the Golden Age for a New Generation — at the L. Ron Hubbard Birthday Event in March, to a standing ovation from the likes of Tom Cruise and John Travolta, who were in the front...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: [Dave’s big show in Clearwater on August 1] A few weeks ago, we told you that there was mounting evidence which suggested to us that Scientology’s most famous celebrity, Tom Cruise, did attend the church’s big ground-breaking ceremony in Clearwater, Florida for the...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: [JT with Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee, and Tommy] Another tribute to seminal New York punk band the Ramones is happening tomorrow at the Hollywood Forever cemetery, where legendary guitarist Johnny Ramone is buried. The event will mark 50 years since the release of the band’s...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: In February, we received an email from a longtime reader, asking for our help after his wife, whom we have called Dawn, received an unsolicited and unwanted sexual video from Lemonheads frontman Evan Dando. Our story about that blew up across the media, and Dando...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: [Also, just in: The court has denied Scientology’s request to put in one more argument about its amicus brief for Danny Masterson, see below.] On July 31, California’s Second Appellate District issued a ruling in Leah Remini’s lawsuit against the Church of...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: Eleven years ago, we were fortunate to premiere a number of fascinating videos at the Underground Bunker. They were outtakes from Channel 4 UK’s excellent 1997 documentary, Secret Lives — L. Ron Hubbard that were being released for the first time. And of those, one of...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: [Amir Essalhi, Alex Barnes-Ross, Danielle Chamberlain and Zoe Hancock in June] Here’s the latest from Alex Barnes-Ross in London… In June, Amir Essalhi, Danielle Chamberlin, and Zoe Hancock joined me in delivering a petition to 10 Downing Street. Co-signed by the...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: Former Scientology film director Mitch Brisker has more eye-opening photos for us that he took on the church’s movie sets, but first we need to set up these new images with some backstory. (See his previous photos here and here.) Five years ago, we got very lucky when...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: [Sure, it looks rough now…] Longtime reader Once Born sent us photos from his trip to check on Scientology’s “Ideal Org” project in Manchester, England. And he found that work is definitely underway! It’s a difficult place to find. All I knew going in was that it was...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: [Suri in costume in Edinburgh, and Amir in his former life] We got a message late last night from our new friend Amir Essalhi, the recently defected Scientology staffer in Edinburgh. Here’s the text of the voice message he sent us… I just saw Suri Cruise — or Suri...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: Yesterday we shared with you some terrific photos sent to us by former Scientology film director Mitch Brisker. For years, he worked for Scientology leader David Miscavige, who spent lavishly on the production of movies that were meant only for the consumption of...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: [Mitch Brisker knows what’s in the tech films] Last week, we told you about hearing from a reader who remembered seeing a film in Scientology that, on reflection, struck him as very relevant to some of the court cases that the church finds itself in these days. In...

TONY ORTEGA Excerpt: In 2020, when longtime Scientology critic Mark Bunker won a seat on Clearwater, Florida’s city council — where Scientology’s “spiritual mecca” the Flag Land Base is located — he did so with a plurality, but not a majority, of votes in his district. It was an upset win...