Tom Cruise and Scientology

In the past seven years, the church has poured at least $45 million into the former Gilman Hot Springs resort. In the foreground is the $18.5-million management building that includes a wing of offices for church leader David Miscavige.

A close view of “Bonnie View,” a $9.4-million mansion that ex-members say was constructed for the expected return of late church founder L. Ron Hubbard. Church officials say the mansion is simply a museum to commemorate Hubbard’’s life and house most of his possessions.

An aerial view of the 72,000-square-foot Golden Era Productions main studio building, known as “The Castle.” With three soundstages, the studio turns out a dozen films each year, along with other training and educational videos.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

The guest cottages at the Church of Scientology facility at Gilman Hot Springs, where Tom Cruise stayed during extended visits during the late 1980s and early 1990s, while studying Scientology. Church officials note that other visitors, including celebrities, also have used the cottages.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Receptionist Charlotte Heldt at Golden Era Productions. The artwork behind her depicts Scientology’s “Bridge to Total Freedom,” the church’’s path to enlightenment.

On the set at Golden Era Productions, where Scientology films and training videos are produced for sale to church members around the world.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Tony Cifarelli, a church staffer at Golden Era Productions, monitoring machinery in the CD and DVD replication plant. The studio manufactures 10 million CDs each year that are later sold to church members around the world.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Mike Ogletree, the former drummer for the ‘80s rock group Simple Minds, mixes music with a voice recording at Golden Era Productions. The facilities include two voice restoration studios, where staffers work around the clock restoring the church’s archive of Hubbard’s 3,000 public lectures that date to the 1950s.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Inside Golden Era Productions, staffers produce nearly all the printed materials for the church. Here, a foil is pressed onto a lecture binder cover that will be used for a CD of one of Hubbard’’s speeches that has been translated into German.

Ron Clifford, a church staff member at Gilman Hot Springs, assembles an “e-meter,” a machine used by Scientologists to measure spiritual clarity. The facilities churn out 10,000 e-meters every year, according to the church. The machines are sold to church members for about $5,000 each.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Hubbard invented the “e-meter” as a device that could measure the spiritual clarity of his followers.

A bank of photo copiers at Golden Era Productions runs 24-7, printing Scientology materials with the words of Hubbard for adherents around the globe.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Inside a sound studio at Golden Era Productions, Sandy Wooderson monitors analog audiotape machines that produce cassette tapes of Hubbard’s lectures. The facility includes four multi-track recording facilities for music orchestration as well as film and video mixing.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Film editor Lily Estrada uses a loupe to inspect a Dianetics film at Golden Era Productions.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Staffers at Golden Era Productions, Roberto Assabi (left) and Pierluigi Naletto (right), translate Hubbard’s lectures into Italian as part of Scientology’s project to translate all of the church founder’s lectures into 15 languages.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Inside Golden Era Productions, church staffer Gary Press monitors machine temperatures in the motion picture processing lab.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Golden Era Productions music director Peter Schless watches a video monitor while scoring a Scientology production with assistant Neil Kunen (background). Schless co-wrote the 1982 hit “On the Wings of Love.”  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Makeup artists Aleah Chisholm (green shirt, left) and Mimica Price (green shirt, right) prepare actresses Ana Willoughby and Linda Sukkestad for a shoot, inside the makeup department at the Golden Era studio.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Mike Rinder, head of Scientology International’s Office of Special Affairs.  (Don Kelsen / LAT)

Tom Cruise gestures toward Matt Lauer during the telecast of NBC’s “Today Show” in June. The two clashed during the interview when Lauer began discussing antidepressants and Scientology.  (Virginia Sherwood NBC / AP)