Tom Cruise’s Surprising Relationship With 16-Year-Old Daughter Suri

Tom Cruise has reportedly not seen 16-year-old daughter Suri Cruise in close to a decade. Cruise and Katie Holmes welcomed Suri in April 2006. Since Cruise and Holmes split in 2011 and divorced in 2012, Cruise has drifted further from Suri, who lives with Holmes in New York City.

A source told Page Six on Wednesday that Cruise, 60, has not seen Suri in “a very long time” and is “not part” of her life. Cruise’s representatives did not respond to Page Six to comment. Meanwhile, Suri appears to be living a drama-free life with Holmes, 44, and has been seen walking around the city with her mom or friends.

Cruise has not said much publicly about his relationship with Suri. In a 2013 deposition from his defamation lawsuit against publisher Bauer Media, Cruise said he had not seen Suri for at least three months. “Listen, when there is a divorce… things change,” Cruise said. “It’s not an ideal scene. It’s not an ideal situation.” In that deposition, Cruise was asked if Holmes wanted to “protect” Suri from the Church of Scientology. “That was one of the assertions, yes,” Cruise replied at the time. (Cruise filed a $50 million defamation lawsuit against Bauer for claiming Cruise “abandoned” Suri. The lawsuit was later settled for undisclosed terms.)

In the years since then, there have been tabloid rumors about how close a relationship Cruise had with his daughter. In 2016, sources told Page Six that Scientology was keeping Crusie from seeing Suri because she was not being raised a Scientologist. “She’s thriving. She’s got lots of friends and a nice, normal life. This is his loss, his issue, his problem,” a source told the outlet at the time. “He must be really brainwashed.”

Around that time, a source told InTouch Weekly Cruise hadn’t seen Suri in 1,000 days. “They used to Skype and text, but that trailed off drastically,” another source told the outlet. “He uses his film commitments as an excuse, but the truth is that doesn’t hold much weight with Suri anymore.”

Holmes slowed down her career to spend more time with Suri. Last year, she starred in her first movie in two years, Alone Together, which she also wrote and directed. “My child is the most important person to me, and her upbringing is paramount to my work right now,” she told Town & Country in 2017. “It’s very important that I’m present and she has a stable, innocent childhood. I feel so blessed to do what I do, but there’s nothing in the world better than watching your child succeed.”

In that same interview, Holmes admitted it was “heartbreaking” to watch Suri grow. “You want them to stay with you forever, but they’re these amazing beings, and you have to do everything you can to give them what they need – and then they’re going to go,” she said. “And that’s going to be very, very sad for me.”

Cruise also adopted two children with Nicole Kidman during their marriage, Bella, 30, and Connor, 28. They have both reportedly followed Cruise’s footsteps and are members of the Church of Scientology. In 2019, Kidman was reportedly barred from attending Connor’s wedding. In 2015, a source told PEOPLE that Kidman wasn’t even aware that Bella was getting married, but was “very happy” for her.