'How I Met Your Mother' Star On Dating Tom Cruise

Fun fact: “How I Met Your Mother” star Nazanin Boniadi was groomed by the Church of Scientology as a girlfriend for Tom Cruise.

Boniadi, who played Barney’s love interest Nora, opened up to Vanity Fair about how Scientologists essentially auditioned her to be a possible love match for the “Mission: Impossible” star.

Wife of Scientology chief David Miscavige, Shelly Miscavige, “devised an elaborate auditioning process in which actresses who were already Scientology members were called in, told they were auditioning for a new training film, and then asked a set of curious questions, including ‘What do you think of Tom Cruise?’”

The actresses were then presented with a hand-written note that read, “Do you like Tom? Check yes or no.” Actresses that said no were told they were fat and smelled and Tom didn’t like them anyway.

From these audition tapes, Boniadi, who was born in Iran and raised in London, was chosen. She was told that she “had been selected for a very important mission.”

Insert “should she choose to accept” joke here.

In a month-long process she was “audited” every day, which involved her disclosing to a Scientology official secrets and details about her sexual past. She was told to lose her braces, highlights, and, oh, sad, her boyfriend at the time—a process helped along by some confidential videos of the boyfriend that apparently were enough to warrant a break up.

In 2004 she was flown to New York to meet Cruise, and finally got the sense of what the heck was going on. Better late than never?

The two hit it off and actually dated. However not long into the relationship, Boniadi started to have doubts. Cruise would report anything he “found fault with… to a member of the Scientology staff, and she would be audited for it.” Tattletale.

Despite this, Boniadi fell in love with Cruise. However his demand for PDA’s wore on her, and Cruise complained, “I get more love from an extra than I get from you.”

It didn’t take long for Scientology to step in and request Boniadi to move herself on out of Cruise’s pad and into their Celebrity Centre, because Cruise “wanted someone with her own power—like Nicole.”

Nice, Cruise. Make your lackeys dump your live-in girlfriend. Classy move.

At the center, Boniadi broke down and spoke about her relationship—something that the many confidentiality agreements she had signed had forbidden. A “friend” reported her, and her punishment was to “scrub toilets with a toothbrush, clean bathroom tiles with acid, and dig ditches in the middle of the night. After that she was sent out to sell Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard’s ‘Dianetics’ on street corners,” and basically all the other chores that no one wanted from the Honey-Do List, like trimming the hedges with acid, taking out the trash with acid, and walking the dog with acid.

Happily, the interview concluded by noting that Boniadi is no longer involved in Scientology.

Can’t imagine why.