For reasons that defy understanding (and that only reinforce the fact that “the news” hasn’t reported any relevant news in decades), the ABC News website has compiled a short but surprising list of celebrity scientologists. It turns out that Wikipedia offers an even more extensive list. So I’ve been thinking - what kind of fun can we possibly have with this information without receiving a C&D from the House of Hubbard?
Six Degrees of Scientology, of course!
By now, you should all be more than aware of the concept. It’s just like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, only enlightened. All you have to do is connect two members of the Church of Scientology in six or less steps. I’ll demonstrate;
Tom Cruise to Beck: Tom Cruise was in Vanilla Sky with Jason Lee (1) who stars in My Name is Earl in which Giovanni Ribisi plays a recurring role (2). Giovanni is the brother of Marissa Ribisi (3) who is Beck’s wife! (4)
See? Easy as pie. So I’ll toss up the first challenge. Whoever finds a solution first can create the next question. See? Who says we can’t have fun in the comments?
I don’t have a solution to this one yet myself, but I’ll start you off with two folks whose bodies of work should make this easy;
John Travolta to Juliette Lewis. Good luck!
Fine fine:
John Travolta was in “Basic” with Giovani Ribisi, who was in “The Other Sister” with Juliette Lewis. Again, Ribisi is the scientological lynchpin.
So my challenge (and much like Jim, I’m not finding out the answer first): two small screen darlings, Leah Remini and Jenna Elfman. And… go.
Can I play? I’ve got it, as long as the people in between don’t have to be Scientologists.
Leah Remini was in “Old School” with Luke Wilson (1), who was in “The Royal Tenenbaums” with Ben Stiller (2), who was in “Keeping the Faith” with Jenna Elfman (3).
If that’s acceptable, I pose the challenge of…Kirstie Alley and Ethan Suplee.
I was hoping we could have done it with scientologists only, but it looks like that’s stumped a lot of people - so yeah, your answer is kosher. Kirstie Alley and Ethan Suplee it is!
Okay seriously, changing the name of this to 6 Degrees of Giovani Ribisi. Under six *and* with only scientologists:
Kirstie Alley to John Travolta (ah, Look Who’s Talking *Now*… neither of you), to Giovani Ribisi in the aforementioned “Basic” and then Giovani Ribisi and Ethan Suplee in “Cold Mountain”.
My turn again?
Katie Holmes to Isaac Hayes. Shouldn’t be terribly hard…