Tom Cruise: 25 things you may or may not know

1 Born on the third of July

Thomas Cruise Mapother IV was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, New York, but the family moved around and he attended 15 different schools in 12 years. “I had no close friend,” he told The Sunday Times in 2006. “I was always the new kid with the wrong shoes, the wrong accent. His father, an electrical engineer, Cruise said, was “a bully, a coward. The kind of person where, if something goes wrong, they kick you”.

2 Mixed-up kid

At 7, he was assessed as being dyslexic.

3 Get physical

The sporty Cruise lost a tooth playing British Bulldog and injured his knee while wrestling. The latter prompted him to channel his eye-bulging competitiveness into acting, auditioning for a high-school production of Guys and Dolls.

4 Losing his religion

He briefly attended a Franciscan seminary intending to become a Catholic priest, but left after a year. It is unclear whether it was the ascetism or Cincinatti that put him off.

5 No thanks for the memories

Cruise counts his 25 years from Risky Business (1983). Does that mean he would rather forget Endless Love, Taps (both 1981) and The Outsiders (1983), which starred Rob Lowe and Patrick Swayze?

6 Young enterprise

But Risky Business was his first iconic role, his horny teenager turning his parents' house into a brothel and lip-synching to Bob Seger's Old Time Rock and Roll in his underwear. A 5ft 7in legend was born.

7 Tom Gun

In 1986, Cruise went stratospheric as a navy pilot in Top Gun, a feature-length advert for Reaganite military muscle that grossed $300 million, boosted navy recruitment and impelled small boys on BMXs to yell: “I feel the need - the need for speed!”

8 Finding his religion

In 1987, Cruise married the actor Mimi Rogers, seven years his senior, who is a Scientologist. He later joined the religion and is now rumoured to be an Operating Thetan level 7, one of Scientology's elite beings who are reputed to be able to use telekinesis, leave their bodies at will and telepathically control human beings and animals.

9 Playing with the big boys

Cruise starred opposite Paul Newman in The Colour of Money (1986) and Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man (1988), and earned the first of three Oscar nominations as a paraplegic Vietnam veteran in Oliver Stone's Born on the Fourth of July (1989).

10 Thunderbolt

He then felt the need for more speed. But all he got from the motor-racing drama Days of Thunder (1990) were scathing reviews and a second wife, his co-star Nicole Kidman. They would later adopt two children, Isabella and Connor.

11 Bloodsport

The closest the relentlessly heterosexual Cruise has come to playing gay - not counting the famously homoerotic shirtless volleyball scene in Top Gun - was as Lestat the ambiguous bloodsucker in Interview with the Vampire (1994), an adaptation of Anne Rice's novel. “Tom Cruise is no more my Lestat than Edward G. Robinson is Rhett Butler,” Rice snorted.

12 Show me the money

With his Oscar-nominated turn as a sports agent in Jerry Maguire (1996), Cruise became the first actor to star in five consecutive films that grossed $100 million in the US.

13 Sister act

In 2004, Cruise replaced his publicist of 14 years, Pat Kingsley, with his sister, fellow Scientologist Lee Anne DeVette. Many attributed his subsequent openness about the religion to this change.

14 The drugs don't work

On NBC's Today programme in 2005, Cruise called psychiatry a “pseudo science” and criticised his Endless Love co-star Brooke Shields for using antidepressants after the birth of her child. “You don't know the history of psychiatry; I do,” he told the presenter Matt Lauer. He later apologised to Shields.

15 Shut that door

A 2005 episode of South Park depicted Cruise refusing to come out of Stan's closet. It has never been shown in the UK.

16 Pulling power

In 2005, Cruise started dating the former Dawson's Creek star Katie Holmes. Marc Headley, a former Scientologist, claimed in the News of the World that the relationship was arranged after an audition process disguised as a casting call. Among those who demurred, said Headley, was Scarlett Johansson, who apparently “freaked out” when she found out that the audition was at a Scientology Centre. Not so Holmes. “I knew immediately that she was the one,” Cruise is reported to have said.

17 Sofa, so bad

Appearing on Oprah Winfrey's talk show in 2005, Cruise leapt on the sofa, punched the floor and shouted, “I'm in love!” The phrase "jumping the couch", referring to someone who tarnishes their reputation in public, was named The Historical Dictionary of American Slang's term of 2005.

18 Crazy in love

Holmes then appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman, who said: “This must be a very exciting time for you. You're in love with Tom Cruise, and Tom, as far as we can tell, has gone nuts.”

19 On a mission

Cruise was nevertheless voted the world's most powerful celebrity by Forbes in 2006. He celebrated by making the rubbish Mission: Impossible III, which still grossed $130 million.

20 Wedding vows

TomKat were married by a Scientology minister at Odescalchi Castle in Italy in front of friends including Will Smith, Jennifer Lopez and the Beckhams. The Scientology leader David Miscavige was the best man.

21 Married young

Each of Cruise's three wives (Rogers, Kidman and Holmes) has been 11 years younger than the last.

22 Birth right

On April 18, 2006, Holmes gave birth to a baby girl named Suri. Claims that Scientology rules forbade her to cry out during labour were denied.

23 Separate ways

Paramount Pictures ended its 14-year relationship with Cruise later that year. “His recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount,” Sumner Redstone, chairman of their parent company Viacom, told The Wall Street Journal.

24 New ventures

Also in 2006, Cruise took joint charge of the United Artists studio, starring in the critically mauled Lions for Lambs and the forthcoming Valkyrie, based on an assassination attempt against Adolf Hitler.

25 The future

Cruise's big mistake was sacking the respected Kingsley, says Max Clifford. “Protection is the most important thing in PR. He's been too public about Scientology. He can turn things around because he's still popular. It's when you disappear from centre stage that it gets difficult.”