John Stamos revealed in a new podcast that he almost became a Scientologist — but was kicked out for hanging around too much.
In an interview with popular impersonator Matt Friend for his podcast “Friend in High Places,” the actor recalled how he was kicked out of the organization as a teenager after just one meeting.
“I was in an acting class, and there was this attractive girl,” Stamos said. “She said, ‘You know, we all meet at this address on Hollywood Boulevard. Come on over later.’” [class]I was working at my dad's restaurant at the time, and I said, 'Dad, I gotta go, I gotta go.' So I went. I was 16 or 17.”
He went to the address, which he discovered was a Scientology building. Upon entering, he was called to undergo an electromyography test, a device that measures the strength of a small electrical current running through the person being tested. The person being tested is asked to hold two metal cans. So, as he held the cans in his hand, the Full House actor recalled how he couldn’t resist the temptation to tell a joke to the group.
“You're carrying these two boxes, so I started [saying]“You know, ‘Hello… Peabody in the Wayback Machine!’” he said in an old-fashioned, cartoon-like voice. “You know, Sherman and Peabody,” referring to the time-traveling characters Rocky and Bullwinkle.
Naturally, Scientologists were not at all pleased with his foolishness.
“They didn’t like it,” he continued. “I was messing around so much that they said, ‘Get out. Get out.’ They just threw me out.”
Stamos previously discussed the incident in his 2023 memoir, If You Had Told Me. In the memoir, Stamos recalls a woman named Mia giving him a book “the size of a brick” after an acting class. “I think it’s going to open your eyes to some amazing things,” he recalls her saying when she invited him to talk about the book the next day.
Watch the full interview below.
