John Stamos had a brush with the Church of Scientology in the 1980s, but he ultimately decided not to become a follower of the religion.
Stamos, 60, recalled in his new book, If You Would Have Told Me, that his former acting teacher’s assistant slyly handed him a Scientology book one day after class. “I’m walking to my car and Mia runs out and hands me my workbooks,” Stamos recalled. “‘Hey, you forgot these.’ She adds an extra book, the size of a brick, to my stack. ‘Start with this one,’ she says, smiling. ‘I think it will open your eyes to some amazing things.’”
Mia then encouraged him to meet him at a Hollywood address that Stamos later discovered was Scientology’s famous Celebrity Centre. “I crack open the book while on my shift at Yellow Basket [restaurant],” Stamos wrote. “There’s a lot about control: controlling your reactionary mind, controlling energy, controlling space and controlling time.”
Stamos was seemingly intrigued enough to take Mia up on the invitation, but he was thrown off as soon as he pulled into the parking lot of the Celebrity Centre, which he described as “grand, ornate and creepy as f–k — a cross between Chateau Marmont, Disney’s Haunted Mansion and a mental hospital.”
Inside the building, Stamos underwent a brief auditing session with an E-meter, although he didn’t use Scientology’s official name for the device. (The church claims E-meter readings indicate changes in emotional states that allow the identification of stored engrams, which are memories of traumatic events from the past.)
“All I can think about is the Wayback Machine from The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show deployed by the genius beagle, Mr. Peabody, and his adopted human boy, Sherman, to time travel through different dimensions,” Stamos recalled. “I’m handed two round things that look like cans. I put one to my ear and the other to my mouth and mimic talking into an old timey telephone: ‘Hello, there.’”
According to Stamos, Mia was irritated with him, while “the weird little man” presiding over the session pinched him on the hand.
“He begins to question me about committing crimes, asks if I have negative thoughts about Scientology or L. Ron Hubbard and probes into some strange sex inquiries,” Stamos continued. “The Wayback Machine needle jumps in the corner, and Mia looks disappointed. Apparently, I’m not Scientology material. Darn it.”
That was apparently the end of Stamos’ connection with the church, which has boasted many celebrity members over the years: Tom Cruise, John Travolta, Danny Masterson and more. Famous former members include Leah Remini and Laura Prepon.
Remini, 53, has become an outspoken critic of the church since leaving the organization in 2013, publishing the memoir Troublemaker: Surviving Hollywood and Scientology and producing the docuseries Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath.
The church, meanwhile, has repeatedly denied Remini’s allegations.
If You Would Have Told Me is available now wherever books are sold.
