Do you people really want the truth?

Can you handle the truth?

You all are going to have to calm yourself so you won't make it through the hour.

Because he's in the building! Hello and welcome! Hello and welcome to season two of Lay Do You Remember This?

A podcast where we look back on all the stories from Hollywood's best, worst decade,

the early 2000s, a time in history when America found out that with a trust fund,

a sex tape, and a dream, you too could become a star.

I'm your host Darlai, with a new episode entitled They Found Love in a Hopeless Place,

the Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes story.

As I create today's episode, I do so in my home, which is mere blocks away from a Hollywood landmark.

It's not the Getty Museum or the

Libreia Tar Pits or Grumman's Chinese Theater, because, ew, Hollywood and Highland is not a place

where people should live. The landmark that I'm talking about has a dark history, and its presence

looms over the neighborhood of Los Veles, which is just east of Hollywood. Big Blue, the colloquial

name for Scientology's headquarters in Los Angeles. It got its nickname for obvious reasons. The

impressive art deco style building is entirely painted in one shade of vibrant blue. At the top,

enormous gold letters spell out the word

Scientology with an elaborate gold crucifix above it. Some people say Big Blue looks sinister. Some say it's an

eyesore. I say, it's camp, honey. Katie Perry should have dressed up as it for this year's Metball.

It looks like Dracula Smurf built a castle in a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood,

and I think it gives the area a touch of spooky whimsy.

All the best cults experiment with a bold color scheme in one way or another.

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