Scientology Rep Calls Vanity Fair's Report About Nazanin Boniadi, Tom Cruise "Hogwash"; Says Paul Haggis is a "Status Obsessed" Exploiter

Are the claims too outrageous to be true? 

On Sept. 1, Vanity Fair magazine released an investigative piece in which it claimed actress (and former Church of Scientology member)  Nazanin Boniadi was audited to date Tom Cruise. 

According to the magazine article, Boniadi was scrutinized every day in October 2004 and was allegedly "told to lose her braces, her red highlights and her boyfriend" before meeting Cruise the following month in New York City.

Sources claim that although Boniadi did fall for Cruise the actor's affectionate behavior became too much for her to handle. Following a series of incidents with high-ranking Scientology officials, Boniadi was eventually forced to leave Cruise's home, where she lived, and move into Scientology's Celebrity Centre. She was later transferred to another Scientology center in Florida.

However, a rep for Scientology reached out to Us Weekly stating all of the article's contents are false.  

"The entire story is hogwash. There was no project, secret or otherwise, ever conducted by the Church to find a bride (audition or otherwise) for any member of the church," the Church said in a statement. "The allegation and entire premise of the Vanity Fair article is totally false . . . We have been denying this ridiculous tale now since it first appeared in print four years ago."

Scientology's rep also criticized filmmaker and outspoken former Scientologist Paul Haggis who wrote to Showbiz411 on Sept. 2, confirming the Vanity Fair story and defending his friend Bioniadi. 

"I met her through a mutual friend when I was doing my own personal research into the allegations against Scientology, before I wrote my letter of resignation," Haggis wrote. "Naz was embarrassed by her unwitting involvement in the incident and never wanted it to come out, so I kept silent. However I was deeply disturbed by how the highest ranking members of a church could so easily justify using one of their members; how they so callously punished her and then so effectively silenced her when it was done."

According to the rep, Haggis is no more than "a status obsessed apostate who exploited a tenuous connection with Scientology to grab headlines via a publicity stunt whereby he 'resigned' from the Church where he had not been an active parishioner for decades."

The rep added, "He is doing the same again -- attempting to grab headlines and falsely slander his former religion. No Church members were 'used,' nor were they punished, nor silenced. This is totally false."

What's more, the Church claimed Haggis had various motives for coming to Boniadi's offense. The rep even implied that the two were romantically involve though, this is not substantiated by any other sources. 

"Did he reveal to you the relationship he was having with Nazanin Boniadi? We discovered this simply by Googling his name and hers. Here is our question: is it Paul Haggis who started a relationship with Boniadi while auditioning and casting his last film, 'The Next Three Days'? What is the motivation here?" 

In the Church's statement, they claim a group of former Scientologists are exploiting the divorce of Cruise and his third wife, Katie Holmes, which was finalized last month. 

"Both Paul Haggis and Nazanin Boniadi are members of a small self-proclaimed 'posse' of anti-Scientology apostates founded by self-admitted liars and suborners of perjury," the rep said. "This posse has been selling stories to the highest bidder for years . . . In recent weeks, they have exploited this high profile divorce in any way they can by spreading lies to draw attention to themselves so they an make money shilling their self-published books."