ONE OF JESSE PRINCE’S COMPANIONS in RPF was Spanky Taylor, an old friend of Paul Haggis’s from his early days in Scientology. She had become close to Paul and Diane soon after they arrived in Los Angeles. She called him “Paulie,” and had helped him market some of his early scripts when he was still trying to break out of cartoons. From the beginning, she had seen his talent; her own talent was helping others realize theirs.
“Spanky” was a schoolyard nickname for Sylvia, but it had such a teasing twist that she could never escape it. She was the child of Mexican American laborers in San Jose. When she was fourteen, she became a fan of a local cover band called People!, which included several Scientologists. She began helping the group with concert promotion, and soon she was working with some of the other great bands coming out of the Bay Area, such as Creedence Clearwater Revival and Big Brother and the Holding Company. Scientology was just another expression of the political and cultural upheaval of the times. Even members of the Grateful Dead were drawn into Scientology, which promised mystical experiences without hallucinogens. Albert Ribisi, the keyboard player for People!, introduced Spanky to the church. She joined the staff at the Santa Clara mission when she was fifteen.
She was a cheerful young woman with warm brown eyes who called everyone “honey.” Because of her experience with promotion, she was posted to the Celebrity Centre. The place was constantly buzzing with activity—tie-dyeing, fencing, poetry readings—and she loved it. Famous people were always passing through, which added to the sense that something fun and important was happening here.
Spanky inevitably came to the notice of Yvonne Gillham, who had created the Celebrity Centre in 1969, after gaining Hubbard’s permission to go to LA and escape the tension of his romantic pursuit of her. Gillham came to look upon Spanky almost as an extension of herself, with the same easy, natural flair for dealing with people. Even though Spanky was still a teenager, Gillham arranged for her to take care of some of the most important figures associated with the church.
One celebrity quickly took precedence. John Travolta was in Mexico making his first film, The Devil’s Rain, a cheap horror movie starring Ernest Borgnine and William Shatner. He got to be friends with Joan Prather, a promising young actress and dancer, who was one of the few cast members his age. “He glommed onto me from day one,” she said. “He was extremely unhappy and not doing well.” Prather began talking about how much Scientology had helped her. Actors are often asked to get in touch with feelings that can be quite devastating. “Dianetics offered a tool to get to one’s raw emotions without going completely bonkers,” she observed.
“It sounded really interesting, so I brought up certain things about my case and asked if that could be handled,” Travolta later recalled. “And she said it could. I said, ‘Come on … could THAT be handled? You know, I couldn’t believe it.” Prather gave him a copy of Dianetics. It helped with his bouts of depression and insomnia. “Sometimes people say the most incredible things in the world to me that last year would make me suicidal,” he observed. On another occasion he remarked, “Before Dianetics, if people said negative things to me or about me, I would cave in easily. Being a man, that wasn’t a very appealing quality. Some people would say, ‘The boy is too sensitive.’ But many times I had suppressive people around me who would cave me in on purpose. I was sort of like a minefield.”
Prather also counseled him using some of the basic processes of Scientology. “I went outside my body,” Travolta later said. “It was like the body was sort of on its own and I was outside walking round it. I got real frightened, and she said, ‘Oh my goodness, you’ve gone exterior.’ ”
When he returned to Los Angeles, Travolta began taking the Hubbard Qualified Scientologist Course at the Celebrity Centre with about 150 other students. He confided to the teacher, Sandy Kent, that he was about to audition for a television show, Welcome Back, Kotter. After roll call, Kent instructed everyone to point in the direction of ABC Studios and telepathically communicate the instruction: “We want John Travolta for the part.” At the next meeting, Travolta revealed he had gotten the role of Vinnie Barbarino—the part that would soon make him famous. “My career immediately took off,” Travolta boasted in a church publication. “I would say Scientology put me in the big time.”
Gillham adored Travolta and constantly told him he was going to be a star. To prove it, she gave him Spanky.