Tom Cruise biography, ex-wives, height, net worth, scientology, kids, age 2025

Tom Cruise Biography

Tom Cruise (Thomas Cruise Mapother IV) is a legendary American actor, director, and producer who shot to stardom with his iconic roles in Rain Man, Eyes Wide Shut, Magnolia, and the blockbuster Mission: Impossible franchise. Cruise has won three Golden Globe awards and earned three Academy Award nominations. Net worth: over $600 million.

Childhood and Family

Tom Cruise was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, New York in a catholic family of English, German, and Irish ancestry. His father, Thomas Cruise Mapother III, was an electrical engineer and his mother, Mary Lee née Pfeiffer, was a special education teacher (however, probably because of her namesake Michelle Pfeiffer, some resources erroneously indicate that she was an actress). Cruise has three sisters: Lee Anne, Marian, and Cass.

The family lived in poverty and constantly moved from one place to another because the father had troubles with his jobs. Cruise's dad was very strict with his children, he was also often rude and unfair; and on top of that, he would beat his kids often for no reason at all. Later on, Cruise called his father a bully and a coward.

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 is something wrong with this guy. Do not trust him. Be careful around him.

As a child, Cruise struggled with serious self-esteem issues. He was especially self-conscious about his height, which led him to hang out mostly with shorter peers or younger kids so he wouldn't look as short by comparison. On top of his height concerns, the future star also had severely crooked teeth.

Little Tom (left) with his parents and sisters

By age 14, Cruise had attended 15 different schools, so it's no surprise he struggled academically. He also had dyslexia (a learning disorder that affects how a person perceives the order of letters in text), which made things even worse, but fortunately he managed to overcome this disability over time.

In his childhood, Tom Cruise had self-esteem issues due to his crooked teeth and dyslexia

In 1971, the family moved to Ottawa, Canada because Cruise's father took a position as a consultant with the Canadian Armed Forces. There, Cruise attended Robert Hopkins Public School, where he first got involved in drama. His debut at a school drama festival in a group with 6 other students was a tremendous success. "The movement and improvisation were excellent. It was a classic ensemble piece," his teacher recalled.

Hoping to grow up faster and become stronger, Cruise also started to play sports intensely. Floor hockey was one of his hobbies, though he was better known for his aggression than his talent. At one point, Cruise even considered becoming a professional wrestler, but a knee injury ended that dream.

When Cruise was 14, his parents divorced and his mother brought all five kids back to the USA. They settled down in Louisville, Kentucky. Cruise enrolled in a Franciscan seminary in Cincinnati, Ohio and he planned to become a Catholic priest. However, a year later he gave up on the idea and returned to a regular school.

Tom Cruise lived in this house in Louisville after his parents divorced

The family was struggling financially. The mother worked 2–3 jobs to feed the family; the kids also had part-time jobs after classes. When Tom was 16, his mom married again. Her new husband, Jack South, proved to be a wonderful stepfather, and Cruise always said nice things about him. "He loved my mother so much that he took us all in, all four kids," Cruise said.

That same year, at the age of 16, Cruise was encouraged by his teacher to give school drama another shot. That's when Tom discovered, much to his surprise, that he'd found his calling. His mom wholeheartedly supported his dream of becoming an actor; when she was young, she'd also dreamed of working in theater and film but she never pursued acting because, as she explained, she was afraid to stray from the church and cross moral boundaries that might cost her everything girls valued back then.

Tom Cruise's father died of cancer in 1984.

Acting Career

While Tom Cruise never formally trained as an actor, he caught his break in 1981 when he was cast in a small role in the film Endless Love. Later that year, he played a supporting role in Taps.

Endless Love: Tom Cruise's first movie role

In 1983, Cruise appeared in Francis Ford Coppola's The Outsiders, and the charming young actor was then offered his first leading role in the youth sports drama All the Right Moves.

In 1986, Tom Cruise landed one of the leading roles in Martin Scorsese's drama The Color of Money, which paired him with the already legendary Paul Newman.

Tom Cruise and Paul Newman on the set of the movie The Color of Money

Roger Donaldson's romantic drama Cocktail starring Cruise was released in 1988, but it flopped. Cruise's leading role earned him a Razzie nomination for Worst Actor, and the movie was panned by critics. Critics slammed it as a "shallow, dramatically inert romance that squanders Tom Cruise's talents in what amounts to a naive barkeep's banal fantasy."

Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman made one of the best acting duos

However, 1988 also brought a major hit. Barry Levinson's Rain Man marked the beginning of a series of Tom Cruise's mature and substantial acting works. The film showcased a fascinating acting duo: Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman. Cruise played a calculating businessman angry at his parents and the world, while Hoffman delivered a tragicomic performance as his helpless autistic older brother.

Tom Cruise in the film Interview with the Vampire

Born on the Fourth of July, a 1989 war drama film directed by Oliver Stone, earned Tom Cruise his first Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award nomination.

Mission: Impossible (1996), directed by Brian De Palma, was a massive hit and became Tom Cruise's signature franchise. Not only did he play the lead but he also debuted as a producer. While making the film, Cruise fulfilled his childhood dream of playing a super-agent who'd be even cooler than James Bond.

Tom Cruise's famous stunt from the Mission: Impossible

Despite critics' lukewarm response to the overly complex plot and shallow character development, audiences loved the film's spectacular action and dynamic pace.

Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman at the Academy Awards 1991

That same year, the actor starred in another remarkable film – Cameron Crowe's Jerry Maguire – that earned Tom Cruise his second Golden Globe award and one more Academy Award nomination. Cruise starred with then-newcomer Renée Zellweger, and the film became a launchpad for her further successful career. The movie earned critical praise as "an exceptionally tasty contemporary romantic comedy". The film was also nominated for five Academy Awards and won one.

Jerry Maguire earned 5 Academy Awards nominations

In 1999, Cruise co-starred with his wife Nicole Kidman in Stanley Kubrick's erotic thriller film Eyes Wide Shut. It was the last work of the great director; in fact, the film was released after his death. The audience took the movie differently: some dismissed it as a massive failure while others hailed it as a masterpiece; but most agreed it challenges viewers, provokes thought and captivates with its mysterious atmosphere charged with raw desire.

Afterward, Tom Cruise produced Mission: Impossible 2 where he returned as resourceful superspy Ethan Hunt. This time the film was directed by John Woo from Hong Kong. The director employed the martial art style involving firearms that he had come up with earlier. This martial arts style is called Gun Kata – also known as "kung fu with a gun" or "bullet ballet".

All the motorcycle stunts are performed by Tom Cruise himself

At the beginning of the 2000s, Cruise starred in four highly anticipated films aiming for massive box office success and universal critical acclaim. Cameron Crowe's Vanilla Sky (2001), a science fiction psychological thriller, was one of them. Tom Cruise co-starred with Cameron Diaz and Penelope Cruz, with Kurt Russell and Jason Lee appearing in supporting roles.

In 2003, Tom Cruise co-produced Edward Zwick's Japanese historical drama The Last Samurai. The film was a tremendous success: it got four Academy Awards nominations as well as numerous other prizes and nominations, and Tom Cruise received a Golden Globe nomination for the best actor. However, despite Cruise's expectations, he didn't receive an Oscar nomination for Best Actor.

In 2005, Cruise worked again with Steven Spielberg in the science fiction disaster film War of the Worlds, which is based on the novel of the same title by H. G. Wells. On the set, he worked with an 11-year-old Dakota Fanning, who was already an experienced actress despite her age, and a 15-year-old Channing Tatum who appeared in one of the episodes.

In the film War of the Worlds Tom Cruise doesn't save the world

James Mangold's action comedy film Knight and Day (2010) was the next film with Cruise in the title role, and it was his second on-screen collaboration with Cameron Diaz. While some critics noted that "logic and plausibility take a holiday in this nonstop actioner that counts on stars Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz to sell the nonsense," audiences loved the film and it became a major box office hit.

Joseph Kosinski's post-apocalyptic action film Oblivion was released in 2013. Tom Cruise starred alongside Olga Kurylenko, actress of Ukrainian descent, and also co-starred with Morgan Freeman. The movie was characterized as "an absolutely gorgeous film dramatically caught between its aspirations for poetic romanticism and the demands of heavy sci-fi action."

Christopher McQuarrie's Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, the fifth installment in the Mission: Impossible film series, was released in 2015, and once again delivered impressive ratings and box office success for the actor-producer.

In 2017, Cruise had the leading role in Alex Kurtzman's action-adventure film The Mummy, a reboot of the 1932 movie of the same name. This film, however, was not as successful as the actor's previous works. In October 2017, Tom Cruise appeared in American Made, a biographical thriller directed by Doug Liman, where he played a young pilot recruited by the CIA. Mission: Impossible – Fallout, featuring Tom Cruise as the lead actor and co-producer, was released in the summer of 2018.

Tom Cruise on «Mission: Impossible – Fallout» set

The action sequel "Top Gun: Maverick" starring Tom Cruise was scheduled for 2020. The actor is also involved in the filming of the film "Mission: Impossible 7". In May 2020, it became known that Tom Cruise teamed up with engineer Elon Musk, who invited him to participate in a film project, the shooting of which can take place in space.

Personal Life

In the first half of the 1980s, Tom Cruise had a number of relationships with older women, including Rebecca De Mornay, his partner in the film Risky Business, who is 3 years older than him; Patti Scialfa, a singer and guitarist, who is 9 years older than him; and a well-known singer Cher, sixteen years his senior. The latter frankly confessed that Cruise was very good in bed and she ranked him in the top 5 of her lovers. "I was crazy for Tom Cruise - and we had a fling," admitted Cher.

Young Tom Cruise with his first girlfriend

Tom Cruise settled down when he married actress Mimi Rogers in 1987 (she was also older than Cruise, by 5–8 years, according to different sources). Rogers was the one to introduce Cruise to the Church of Scientology. He later became a devoted follower and promoter of this religion, eventually rising to become the third or even second-highest member in the church hierarchy.

Tom Cruise has converted into Scientology thanks to his girlfriend Mimi Rogers

In 1989, on the set of the film Days of Thunder Cruise met Nicole Kidman, a young actress from Australia. They began an affair and the smitten Cruise divorced his first wife on February 4, 1990. Later that same year, on December 24, the 28-year-old Cruise married the 23-year-old Kidman.

Nicole Kidman married Tom Cruise when she was 23

The couple desperately wanted children but couldn't conceive, so they decided to adopt. In 1992, they adopted Isabella Jane, and in 1995, they adopted Connor Anthony. Later on, Kidman admitted that she was surprised by her own determination to have a family so early. "I had two kids by the time I was 27 and I'd been married for four years. But that's what I wanted," she recalled.

However, in February 2001, Cruise told his wife that he was filing for divorce. According to Kidman, she begged her husband not to abandon the family, but he refused to discuss anything and left without explanation. As it later turned out, Kidman was already pregnant at that time but the couple didn't know about it yet. Because of all the stress that the actress was going through, she lost the baby, and, as she later confessed, it was an ectopic pregnancy.

Almost at the same time as going through the divorce process, Cruise entered into a new relationship with his Vanilla Sky partner Penélope Cruz. The romance was intense and the couple even discussed marriage, but three years later they called it quits. According to Penélope, Scientology became an obstacle to their further relationship. She wouldn't abandon her Buddhist beliefs for Cruise's religion, which was a dealbreaker for him.

Tom Cruise and Penélope Cruz's relationship didn't stand the test of religion

In April 2005, Cruise began dating actress Katie Holmes, and only a month later, Cruise publicly declared his love for Holmes on The Oprah Winfrey Show. On October 6 of the same year, the couple announced that they were expecting a baby. Their daughter Suri was born on April 18, 2006.

Unlike Cruise's previous partners, Katie Holmes agreed to convert to Scientology, and on November 18, 2006, the couple officially registered their marriage.

The couple appeared blissfully happy in public, but rumors swirled that 'Mrs. Cruise' was living in 'Scientology hell' under constant surveillance. In a move that reportedly blindsided Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes filed for divorce on June 29, 2012, seeking full custody of their daughter. She also announced that she was leaving Scientology and decided to raise Suri in the Catholic religion, so she enrolled her in a private catholic school in Manhattan.

In 2012, the "Club of Tom Cruise's former wives" expanded its membership

In March 2017, reports surfaced about Tom Cruise's romance with Vanessa Kirby, his 28-year-old co-star from Mission: Impossible – Fallout.

Vanessa Kirby is Tom Cruise's new girlfriend

Tom Cruise actively participates in Scientology's social programs and passionately advocates for the church's recognition as an official religion in Europe.

Tom Cruise Now

Mission: Impossible 7 is set to hit theaters in 2023. On set Tom Cruise worked a lot with Henry Cavill. The franchise's eighth installment follows in 2024. It could very well be the final Mission: Impossible film—at least for Tom's character.

Rumors suggest SpaceX is interested in helping the actor achieve his goal of filming a movie on the ISS or in outer space.

Tom Cruise: latest news and articles

Tom Cruise to Receive Honorary Oscar

18 Jun 2025

Carlos Austin Wood

The Last Samurai - the coolest movie with Cruise.

2021-04-30 11:39:48
Joan Ortiz

I liked the series of movies `Jack Reacher` with Cruise, I could watch it in one breath.

2021-04-11 10:27:37
Clayton Davis

It turns out that Tom Cruise has a short stature and that`s why he is being mad often on the movie set :)

2021-04-04 21:23:22
Gabriel Samuel White

I like the film series Mission: Impossible! And also in Top Gun Tom was at his professional zenith in my view.

2021-03-19 20:32:09
Richard Miller

Recently I started to rewatch many movies with Cruise, he is a great actor.

2021-02-21 09:27:37

Photos: Tom Cruise