Fathers’ last names in Hollywood seem to be becoming quite a burden. After several of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s children turned 18 and dropped Pitt from their names in favor of solely using their mother’s last name, another Hollywood child has made a similar decision.
Suri, the only child of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, has reportedly changed her name to Suri Noelle.
Page Six was the first to report that Suri—now a student at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania—has registered to vote in Allegheny County under the name Suri Noelle. According to the outlet, the change likely took place in 2024, during her freshman year of college.
Page Six also reports that Suri did not file an application to change her last name in Allegheny County, leading to speculation that she did so in New York, where she lived before starting college and where name-change requests are typically sealed.
Noelle is Katie Holmes’s middle name. The decision to adopt it in the place of Cruise’s surname might suggest a desire to honor her mother. Holmes primarily raised Suri and has always been present during the most important moments of her daughter’s life, such as when she got her college acceptance, for which the Dawson’s Creek alum expressed great pride. “Of course, I will miss the close proximity, but I’m really proud of her, and I’m happy,” Holmes told Town & Country in 2024.
As for her father, Suri reportedly has had no contact with Cruise in over 10 years. Holmes and Cruise were married in November 2006, seven months after their only child was born in April of the same year. For a time, the three appeared to be a close-knit unit, often captured by the paparazzi in moments of harmony. However, their marriage didn’t last. The couple divorced in 2012.
Holmes was awarded primary legal custody of her daughter, and Cruise reportedly has not been seen with Suri since shortly after the divorce. He’s reportedly stayed involved in her life by paying child support throughout Suri’s childhood.
She was already referred to as Suri Noelle at her high school graduation ceremony at LaGuardia High School in 2024. It is also the name that appears on the playbill for Midsummer!, a modern adaptation of William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, in which she is currently performing alongside other college students at the Peirce Studio of the Trust Arts Education Center in Pittsburgh.
The most widely speculated theory had been that it was a stage name, intended to protect her privacy and allow her to form her own identity. However, it now seems the change is a permanent one.
Originally published in Vanity Fair Italia.