Paul Haggis vs. the Church of Scientology

My wife will occasionally tell people she's a Scientologist, just to see their reactions. Especially when evangelicals are pestering her about whether she's saved or Catholics grill her for thinking it's okay for people to use condoms. Most people just stop talking and often change the subject.

 

Probably not.

 

Yeah. If they're buying the part about their bodies being the reconstituted remains of a civilization that lost an intergalactic war 75 million years ago, a little clerical mixup in a photo is going to be an easy sell.

 

I just started reading it, but I loved this line: "And, given that some well-known Scientologist actors were rumored to be closeted homosexuals..." Big giant screaming WE'RE TALKING ABOUT TOM AND JOHN line there.

 

Wonder how Larry dealt with Scientology's thugs harassing him night and day while he was working on this piece.

You know they were.

 

I think he said his experiences with swimming parents helped him deal with Scientologists.

 

Tell me, sports writer, what are your crimes?

 

@gabrielsherman

Larry Wright tells Terry Gross on Fresh Air that to his knowledge the NYer has never committed as much factchecking resources to one story



@NewYorker The New Yorker

Lawrence Wright talks about his piece on Scientology on @nprfreshair: http://n.pr/fPy9rl

 

I feel compelled to give a shout out to my old roommate, Richard Leiby. We worked together at the Clearwater Sun, where he did a lot of groundbreaking work on Scientology reporting back in the late '70s and early '80s. He went on to Fort Lauderdale (where we did the roommate thing) and the Washington Post (where he still did some Scientology work, and was also the caretaker of Reliable Source for a while).

 

A buddy of mine is a video editor; he was hired by the S'tos to go to their studio in the middle of nowhere, Riverside County, to work a project for 2 weeks. He charged them mileage from Santa Monica, and was on the clock from the moment he left home to the moment he stepped back in his door. He also charged them nearly double his average hourly fee. They didn't blink.

He said, as you can imagine, it was a creepy as all get out. State of the art facility, but he had to be escorted everywhere he went, even to the can. He said he was assigned the same handler every day, and that guy stayed in his bay with him, reading Hubbard books for 2 weeks.

BTW, here's the location. It's huge:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Scientology+Studio+Riverside+County+California&aq=&sll=33.792158,-116.327814&sspn=1.511029,2.776794&ie=UTF8&hq=Scientology+Studio&hnear=Riverside,+California&ll=33.833528,-116.985877&spn=0.011799,0.021694&t=h&z=16

 

Who the hell does your wife hang out with?

 

Just finished. What an unbelievable job on that article. The reporting is stunning.