John Travolta kissed a male masseur in front of a Scientology bigwig, claims an explosive new memoir.
Mike Rinder, who was in the top ranks when he left the organization in 2007, writes in “A Billion Years: My Escape from a Life in the Highest Ranks of Scientology” that he was assigned to help the married “Pulp Fiction” star, now 68, with “some public relations issues” when he allegedly witnessed the kiss.
He recalled chatting to the “Grease” and “Pulp Fiction” star in a hotel suite.
While they spoke, Travolta’s masseur, clad in a bathrobe, walked into the room and kissed the actor on the mouth.
“‘I’ll be in soon,’ John said as the masseur headed toward the bedroom,” Rinder writes. “That was pretty shocking, right in front of a senior Scientology official. It was just not done. I guess it was indicative of the trust he placed on me.”
Travolta and Kelly Preston were married for 28 years but, “Since the beginning of the ’90s, Travolta had been hounded by stories from various alleged male lovers,” Rinder writes.WireImageA representative for Travolta did not comment.
Rinder alleges he was brought in by the church to help squash talk about Travolta’s love life.
Travolta and Preston had three children, including Ella and Benjamin (above). Their son Jett died at age 16.AFP via Getty Images“Since the beginning of the ’90s, Travolta had been hounded by stories from various alleged male lovers, including one of his former pilots as well as a porn star,” Rinder writes.
According to the book, after the National Enquirer contacted Travolta’s team about an upcoming story, the organization swung into action.
Rinder writes that he was appointed to help Travolta (above, with Olivia Newton John in “Grease”) fight off gay rumors.ZUMAPRESS.com“Realizing the potential PR damage a story of gay sex would have on the perfect Scientology couple of John and Kelly [Preston, Travolta’s then wife, who passed away in 2020], we dug up dirt on the sources and threatened the media with lawsuits,” Rinder writes.
Rinder, the Australian-born co-host of “Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath,” writes that the church claims not to be antigay, “yet the threat of a story describing a Scientologist as gay would cause panic internally because for a Scientologist, not being ‘cured’ of homosexuality would indicate, that the tech doesn’t work.”
In the book, Rinder also writes of Travolta (above with Samuel L. Jackson in “Pulp Fiction”) that “the threat of a story describing a Scientologist as gay would cause panic” within the church.Alamy Stock PhotoRinder also writes: “Much has been made of John’s sexuality and whatever the realities of his sexual orientation may be, I firmly believe he would be more open about it, were not for the stigma he feels due to his strong belief in Scientology.”
A spokesperson for Scientology told Page Six: “Mike Rinder is an inveterate liar who seeks to profit from his dishonesty … He supports himself by orchestrating the harassment of his former Church and its leader through false police reports, incendiary propaganda and fraudulent media stories.”
Rinder details his decades in the church of scientology in “A Billion Years.”Travolta’s wife, Preston, died in 2020 of breast cancer. She was 57. The couple shared three children, son, Jett, who died at age 16 in 2009; daughter Ella, 22; and son Benjamin, 11.
