Beck Is in a Weird Squabble With Leah Remini

Over his past, or lack thereof, with Scientology
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 26, 2019 6:18 PM CST
Beck, Leah Remini Squabble Over His Past With Scientology
Beck performs at The Last Weekend Rally presented by Swing Left at the Palace Theatre, Thursday, Nov. 1, 2018, in Los Angeles.   (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP)

Beck has long been reported to be a Scientologist—the singer's father is one, and Beck was married for 14 years to Marissa Ribisi, twin of actor Giovanni Ribisi and member of a well-known Scientology family—and he's discussed his association with the religion in multiple interviews. But now the singer, who filed for divorce from Ribisi in February, is claiming he's never actually been a Scientologist himself. "I think there's a misconception that I am a Scientologist. I'm not a Scientologist. I don't have any connection or affiliation with it. My father has been a Scientologist for a long time, but I've pretty much just focused on my music and my work for most of my life, and tended to do my own thing," he said in a recent interview with the Sydney Morning Herald. "I think it's just something people ran with."

Except, er, Leah Remini and other prominent ex-Scientologists are saying that's not so. "He’s acting like he was never a Scientologist, which is his way of not publicly speaking out and therefore not getting labeled like us and attacked like us," Remini, who often speaks out against the church since her own contentious split with it, tells the Underground Bunker blog. "Pussy move. You can quote me on that." Adds a former executive of the church, "Beck took the chicken’s way out. To say, ‘I’ve never really been a Scientologist’ is an ‘acceptable truth.’ There is no doubt he was a Scientologist. But it’s a way of avoiding questions like ‘Why did you leave?’" The Hollywood Reporter notes Beck himself said in a 2005 interview, "Yeah, I'm a Scientologist." The Daily Beast rounds up a number of old articles about Beck's affiliation with the church and the singer's own past comments on it; see that here for more on the squabble. (More Scientology stories.)

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