Blown for Good Behind the Iron Curtain of Scientology (36 page)

All of this had to be coupled with the fact that all of the speeches, videos, and releases were constantly changing and some might not be done in time for the event.

It seemed that Dave Miscavige would leave it up to the regular executives to get everything prepared for an event up until about three to four weeks before the actual event date. So, most people had been working flat out preparing everything and maybe had a bunch of stuff submitted to Dave for approval. A month before the event, like clockwork, he would review everything submitted and reject it as being the worst he had ever seen. Then he would hold several day and night long meetings explaining to all involved why and how it was the worst he had ever seen, and then complain about the fact that he would have to do it all himself again and make sure everything was done correctly.

After years and years of this, most of us were not even surprised by this; in fact, it was expected. As it drew closer and closer to an event, it would be like, “Is COB going to come down here and tell us what he wants to do?”

The
Freewinds
Anniversary week of events for 2004 would be no different than most other years. We would all stay up day and night and get all the stuff out at the very last second.

There was also the matter of preparing the
Freewinds
to be able to hold these events. The
Freewinds
normally operated at a financial loss year round, except for the one week at the June 6th event. The idea was that the money they made during that week put them back in the black for the year. This was their “Black Friday,” so to speak, and it was for this reason that the
Freewinds
crew LOVED the Gold event crew. Also, when the Gold event crew were aboard, we made any work they normally did look like a walk in the park. Most Gold event crew were up day and night for the entire week and then after the week of events, we would spend two full days packing up our stuff and clearing out.

The
Freewinds
is a tiny cruise ship. It has very small crew quarters and we brought 50 crew members from Gold to put on the events. The ship holds a little over 350 passengers total. So, between the Gold and
Freewinds
crew that was about 100 people right there. That left only about 250 paying passengers that could fit. This meant that all the
Freewinds
crew would have to free up their beds so that the Gold event crew would have a place to sleep. Usually the
Freewinds
crew slept on the floor in the course rooms, restaurants or wherever they could find some open floor space during that week.

Then there was the matter of technical gear. For any given
Freewinds
event, we had at least seven high-end broadcast cameras that fed into the “production truck”. At any other event during the year, an actual TV production truck would pull up to the Shrine Auditorium in LA or Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater. The cameras would be set up and cables run into the truck. Well, there is no place on the
Freewinds
to put a huge semi truck trailer. So, a crew of people went to the
Freewinds
three weeks ahead of everyone else to load the gear onto the ship and build a TV production truck aboard.

About four weeks before the event, the TV production gear was rented in Burbank, CA. The sound and lighting equipment was rented from a place in Camarillo, CA. The sets and props made at Gold were loaded into shipping containers that met up with the other equipment at Long Beach harbor and all of this stuff was loaded onto container ships that headed over to Miami.

When the stuff reached Miami, it went through customs and was loaded into planes that flew to Curacao where the ship docked. When the gear arrived, it was loaded onto the ship in individual cases and then all the empty equipment cases were stored on the island. You can imagine that this was an expensive operation. A normal event that was produced in the United States cost around $400,000. That included a few days or maybe one full week of rentals. For the June 6th event, this stuff was being rented for a month at least! Granted, not as much money was spent on a hall or stage items, but $300,000 in rentals was a large expense for one week of events at the
Freewinds
.

So it was now two days after the
Freewinds
events had concluded for the year. Most of us at Gold were relieved that the week of events had gone well. All the gear had been removed from the
Freewinds
and was on its way back to Miami. Most of the crew were already on their way back or would be heading back now that the
Freewinds
and its facilities had been converted back to their normal operating routines.

We were eating lunch in the MCI dining room. Suddenly, several people throughout the room got up and rushed out. Great! Something is up! Anyone on COB’s lines had a Nextel radio / phone. Most could only dial other Nextels on the Scientology network. No outside lines could be dialed, and if they could, they were monitored closely for “out-security calls.” These Nextels issued group text messages whenever a flap occurred. Whenever people suddenly got up from a meal it was one of three things:

1. COB was pissed off and had called a meeting.

2. Someone had blown the Int Base.

3. Electrical power outage.

As the power was still on, chances were it was one or both of the first two. Sometimes someone blew the Base and then Dave found out about it and was outraged, so no matter what the deal was, we were most likely screwed.

Gold after lunch muster was held and it was a quick one. An announcement was made that anyone who was on the Cine event crew was to meet in the Cine Conference room for an urgent meeting. Well most of the event crew were either still at the
Freewinds
or on their way back to Gold, and those of us who were here were just getting used to sleeping six hours per night again and not in the mood for more event craziness just yet. We headed over to the conference room from the dining hall.

After we all filed in, the CO Gold, Lisa Schroer started to speak over the Conference room speakerphone. She was at the
Freewinds
still. She said that we had another event that had to be put on at the
Freewinds
!

“We are going to throw a birthday party for Mr. Cruise aboard the
Freewinds
!” she happily exclaimed.

What the hell did that have to do with us? Damn, we thought we were going to have to do a bunch of work for an event. That was close! Who gives a crap? Play some music, bake a cake and we are good. Happy Birthday, Tom!

“So this is what we need,” she began. Most of us are ready for the cake and whatever else they needed and then we realized that this party would be like no other. She started listing what they needed, “I will list it out. Write this down. We will need to know the status of all these items in the next few hours:

1. All of the production truck gear needs to be gotten back.

2. All of the cameras and decks need to be set back up at the
Freewinds
.

3. All of the musicians’ gear needs to be brought back.

4. All of the audio gear needs to be sent back.

5. All of the sets items need to be sent back.

6. The teleprompters need to be sent back out.

7. We need about 15 plasma flat screens sent out here.

8. Any event crew who were on their way back to Gold need to be sent back to the
Freewinds
.

9. Whatever gear is being rented, the rentals need to be extended for at least another week or two.

10. Cost is no matter; the costs will be taken care.

11. There is a sushi restaurant in Santa Monica that Mr. Cruise loves. That restaurant needs to be airlifted out to the
Freewinds
. The chefs, the sushi, the whole place needs to be set up at the
Freewinds
.

12. Every single movie that Mr. Cruise has been in needs to be located.

13. Get these movies to Video Editing.

14. An hour long video will be made from these movies and cut to music.

15. Also, the DVD authoring crew needs to get out here so that some DVDs can be made on the ship.

16. If we think of anything else we will let you guys know.

“Okay, so you guys have your marching orders, get it done! I will call back at the end of the night to get a report on where everything stands. All department heads better be on top of their items and be able to report up!” She hung up.

The looks in the room were like no one had ever seen. A birthday party for Mr. Cruise that would take place aboard the
Freewinds
? We throw a birthday party for L. Ron Hubbard and that costs $400,000. Now we are going to throw one for a public Scientologist that will rival that? Wow! The stuff that happened at the Int Base never ceased to amaze me. Oh, and the list of stuff they needed sent back was ALL of the stuff we sent in the first place. She might as well have said, “Send it all back.” That would have been quicker and more accurate.

As the day went on and people were burning the phone lines to get their stuff sorted out, we began to find out what the party would entail:

1. There was going to be a big show in the Starlight Cabaret.

2. It would be a music show just for Tom Cruise.

3. All of the hit songs from each of his movies would be performed by the Golden Era Musicians.

4. There would be moving visuals playing behind the stage that were the best scenes from all his movies.

5. These would also be playing on tons of plasma flat screens throughout the Starlight Cabaret Lounge where all of this would be taking place.

6. When the whole show was over, a DVD would be made of the entire show and this would be presented to Mr. Cruise.

In other words, we were flying all this stuff back to the
Freewinds
for a giant butt kissing! We were going to play his songs and show his movies to him and then give him a DVD of us doing that!

As soon as we heard how the gig was going to go down, most of us came to the same conclusion. One word - Cheese. This was going to come off hokey as hell. It had all of the recipe ingredients for cheese. In fact, if you wanted to make some cheese, you could do so very easily with these people. Luckily, we were thousands of miles away and would not witness this cheese-fest first hand. And, since it was COB’s idea, no matter how cheesy this thing turned out to be, Dave would love it and Tom would at least pretend to love it. I mean, Dave Miscavige once stated that
Battlefield Earth
was by far the BEST movie he had EVER seen! Let this be a yardstick for his taste and quality standards.

The Video Editing crew stayed up for two days cutting the background visuals for the songs. All the rental gear was turned around in Miami and sent back to the ship. The event crew were sent back to the
Freewinds
. The equipment that normally took at least a week to set up had to be set up all over again in just two days. The gear rental companies knew they had us in a tight spot and they told us that we would be paying more for the additional rental time since they had other customers scheduled for the gear that was supposed to be returned to them. We had to pay, there was no other option.

The sushi guys were set, and all other attendant accoutrements were on schedule to arrive for his highness, Lt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, Vampire Lestat, Jerry Maguire, Ethan Hunt, Cole Trickle, Charlie Babbitt, Brian Flanagan, or as we had to address him, Mr. Cruise.

We were told that several other key executives were also going to be there and supposedly if any of the upper level Scientologists wanted to stay and partake, they would have to pony up the cashola for the cheesola. Tommy Davis, Mr. Cruise’s dedicated Scientology handler at the time, would be there. Dave Miscavige, this was his idea, of course he was going to be there. Dave Miscavige’s wife/assistant Shelly would be there. And then ASI execs, IAS Execs and the
Freewinds
Execs could tag along so as to fill the seats in the small entertainment lounge.

Dave and Tom were just hanging out and their entourages were living it up on the private yacht that had been hired for a few weeks to follow the
Freewinds
around. They went aboard the
Freewinds
for dinner and then went over to the Starlight Cabaret Lounge.

Everything was set, the band, the crowd, and the videos.

Dave Miscavige was wearing a tight white t-shirt and black jeans. Tom Cruise was wearing jeans and a green button down shirt with the sleeves rolled up. As they walked in to the theme song from the 1986 movie
Top Gun
, Tom Cruise patted Dave on the back. Fighter jet footage from the movie played on the huge screen behind the lone guitarist on the stage. Everyone in the room was standing, clapping, and cheering. I mean, a guy just turned 42 years old, why not stand and clap for this to Top Gun music?

Tom hugged Dave and Dave’s wife Shelly as the music continued to play. After three minutes of awkward standing and clapping went by, Dave motioned for Tom to sit down. Yes, Tom, there will be another hour of this coming up.

The musicians had been practicing the songs all week and the set list was ultimately dictated by what videos were edited to go with the songs. All songs had constant clips from Tom’s movies playing whilst the band performed. In between each song there was a standing ovation. This went on for the whole set. The songs were:

1. “Top Gun Theme” performed by Golden Era Musicians with guitar solo from Chris Maio.

2. “Old Time Rock and Roll,” from the 1983 film,
Risky Business
, where Tom Cruise becomes a pimp and gets roughed up by some other pimps. This was performed by Stacey Francis.

3. “Kokomo,” from the 1988 film,
Cocktail
,
which won the Worst Movie of the Year award and for which Tom Cruise was nominated for Worst Actor.