Billionaire James Packer Tells All: How Ex-Fiancé Mariah Carey Threatened to Expose His Darkest Secrets — and Tom Cruise Walked Away From Their Friendship … Because of Scientology
Sept. 8 2024, Published 1:12 p.m. ET
James Packer is giving insight into his broken relationships with former fiancée Mariah Carey and ex-friend Tom Cruise.
In a candid interview seen by RadarOnline.com, the billionaire, 57, opened up about what led to the demise of his romance with the music icon, 55, and why the Top Gun star, 62, made the decision to distance himself from him.
Packer labeled his short-lived relationship with Carey a "trainwreck" and said their breakup was one of the "worst times" in his life.
"Mariah and I had broken up and she thought I’d planted a story in a magazine, which I hadn’t, and it made her look bad," he explained during his sit down with 7NEWS. "She was threatening to say things about me and so it was um...it was a trainwreck. It was a trainwreck. The times that I’ve been at my worst, you know, I’ve had a lot on my mind."
The businessman and the "We Belong Together" singer dated for a year before getting engaged in January 2016. However, the former pair were over by October of that year.
As for his once close bond with Cruise, Packer claims Scientology broke their friendship up. "I’m no longer a member of the Church of Scientology," he made clear when asked about the A-lister.
He said, "I was good friends with Tom Cruise. It’s Tom’s choice not mine that we’re not friends anymore. I’ll never say a bad word about him, he was a wonderful friend to me. He is an amazing person."
Packer was also candid about his struggle with mental health and his bipolar diagnosis, which has made him have a nurse with him at all times. "I couldn’t tell you what I’m on because I’m on a bunch of things and someone does it for me," he revealed about the prescription drugs he's used to help him.
"The worst drug I was on, I was put on lithium in 2022 and within two weeks I was a zombie … I was a complete zombie," the investor explained. "My experience is from having worked with psychiatrists in Israel, in Argentina, in America and all sorts of places is if you get put on the wrong drugs, it can be worse, it can be worse [than the mental illness itself."
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Despite the scandals and chaos, he's endured throughout his life, Packer isn't throwing himself a pity party for what he's been through.
He emphasized, "I am not here to play the victim, I think I am a very fortunate person. Money is not a guarantee of happiness but neither is poverty. I would prefer to be rich and unhappy than to try and be poor and unhappy. I think my downs coincided with either being on the wrong medication or having too much stress at work, and when I say too much stress at work, that is code for too much debt and problems with the business.”
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