Tom Cruise Sparked Rumors With Cameron Diaz After His Split With Katie Holmes

Everyone was blindsided when Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes announced they were divorcing — including Cruise himself.

Cruise and Holmes revealed that they were parting ways in 2012 after five years of marriage, with the "Top Gun" star confirming that it's partly because of his connection with the Church of Scientology. During the trial of his defamation case against Bauer media a year later, he claimed that "there is no need to protect [his] daughter from my religion" but eventually admitted the church was "one of the assertions" regarding the reasons behind the split. Cruise's publicist said in a statement that he "is deeply saddened and is concentrating on his three children" following the divorce.

But shortly after the announcement, it didn't seem that Cruise was "deeply saddened" at all, as it was rumored that he struck a relationship with his "Knight and Day" co-star Cameron Diaz. A source told Life & Style that Cruise attended Diaz's 40th birthday in London, where the two also had a secret date, and well, sparks apparently flew right then and there. "A beautiful setting, fabulous food, a happy occasion — the perfect sparks to ignite the flames of a new romance... I could see them hooking up, absolutely," the source dished.

According to both Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, there is absolutely no truth to the claims that they dated each other. Almost immediately after the rumors surfaced, Cruise's team was quick to squash them with a short yet stern statement. "It's false. They are friends," a representative of the actor told E! News.

Diaz, on the other hand, approached the rumor with a bit of levity. In an appearance on "The Graham Norton Show," she confirmed that she did see Cruise on her 40th birthday, but no date ever happened. "Penelope [Cruz] and Javier [Bardem] were staying at the hotel. Tom and Conor, his son, were having dinner with the two of them. They all invited me to sit next to them," she explained, adding that the group took a picture, and despite not seeing Cruise for weeks after, they were "apparently dating."

Interestingly, Cruise denied ever attending Diaz's birthday celebrations. "I don't recall going to a birthday party," he said in his deposition for the defamation trial against Bauer. "I didn't go to Cameron Diaz's birthday party... You've been reading the press. You can't believe everything you read."

It's been a hot minute since Cameron Diaz left the spotlight for good, and as a result, she's not seen as frequently with fellow actors, including Tom Cruise. It's not clear whether they maintained their friendship over the years, but Diaz once shared that she found it delightful to work with someone like Cruise.

"He has a very high standard, so that's a wonderful thing. That's what you know you're getting when you're working with Tom," she shared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in 2010. "You know that you're getting someone who is dedicated to bringing the best product forward possible, and to do that, you have to be engaged in the process." She also thanked Cruise and ex-wife Katie Holmes for attending her Hollywood Star unveiling in 2009. "It was fantastic. It was so lovely of them to come out and show support. My whole family was there and my friends were there, and I consider them that as well." she said, according to Digital Spy.

Cruise also has a lot of respect for Diaz, especially when it comes to professionalism. "She's strong enough. The great thing about Cameron is she's enormously talented, funny and athletic," he told Access Hollywood, adding that she's a reliable partner no matter how crazy their stunts were. "There's a lot of trust because she had full flash blanks in the gun as she's going around [me], they're coming past my head and she was always  — you have to be there with someone and really know that they're gonna be there."