A new Tom Cruise biography is putting one of Hollywood’s most famous and most private movie stars back under the publishing spotlight.
Tom Cruise: A Life, written by bestselling author Jeff Benedict, will be published by Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster on Feb. 23, 2027. People revealed the cover and described the book as an unauthorized biography built from personal records, court documents and hundreds of interviews with people in Cruise’s orbit.
The book will examine the actor’s screen career, private life, marriages and long public association with the Church of Scientology. The publisher is framing it as a full portrait rather than a simple career recap, with Cruise’s movie-star discipline placed alongside the parts of his life he has kept tightly controlled.
Cruise has spent more than four decades as a global box-office force, but his offscreen life remains unusually difficult to pin down for someone so visible.
The Book Will Trace Cruise From Kentucky to Global Stardom
The official Simon & Schuster page says the biography begins with Cruise’s childhood as Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, a Catholic boy from Kentucky whose estrangement from his father became part of his early story. From there, Benedict follows the move into acting and the drive that turned Cruise from a young performer into one of the most bankable stars in film history.
The publisher says Cruise’s 45 movies have grossed more than $13 billion worldwide. The biography will move through early breakthroughs such as Risky Business and Top Gun, then into the Mission: Impossible franchise that made him one of the rare modern actors still closely identified with large-scale theatrical spectacle.
Jeff Benedict Says Cruise Remains Hard to Know
Benedict told People that Cruise fits the kind of figure he has spent years writing about: famous, highly disciplined and still partly unknowable. “So little is known about the man behind his many iconic roles,” he said.
The author has already written or co-written books about Tiger Woods, LeBron James, Tom Brady and the New England Patriots dynasty. Those subjects give him a familiar lane for Cruise: a world-class public performer whose career is built on control, stamina, risk and a carefully managed image.
People said the book will look at Cruise through ambition, fame, power, belief, downfall, regret and redemption. That is the bigger promise behind the biography: not just how Cruise became a movie star, but how he stayed one while remaining so guarded.
The Biography Will Also Address His Personal Life
The book’s description says it will examine the “mystery and misunderstanding” around Cruise’s offscreen life, including his marriages to Mimi Rogers, Nicole Kidman and Katie Holmes. It will also address his advocacy for Scientology and the public controversy surrounding it.
His career includes some of the most recognizable films of the last half-century, but his private life has also shaped public interest in him, especially during the years when his relationships and religious affiliation became major tabloid and entertainment-news stories.
The Announcement Lands During Another Cruise Legacy Stretch
The biography arrives after another major stretch in Cruise’s career, including renewed attention around Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning and his status as one of the few remaining actors whose name can still sell an old-school global theatrical event.
Tom Cruise: A Life is now available for preorder ahead of its Feb. 23, 2027 publication date.