15 Celebs You Didn't Know Had Ridiculously Strict Upbringings

The first reaction when looking at celebrities in Hollywood isn't usually to assume that they come from strict backgrounds. In fact, many people assume that their parents allowed them to run wild and free from a young age, and that's how they developed their unique personalities and standards. That might be true for a few stars, but you'd be surprised at just how many celebrities were brought up with military-like harshness. In some cases, they had extreme stage parents whose constant pushing and intense rules eventually led them to reach the careers that they did, even if that came at a price. In other cases, celebrities actually grew up with strict religious and conservative parents, who completely disapprove of their life choices today. The following 15 celebs are proof that tough upbringing does play a huge part in who you are, your family doesn't have to define you, and you can find your own path.

15 Winona Ryder: Rainbows?

Cults are about as strict as you can get, and many more celebrities spent time in these secluded societies than you would think. Another star who grew up in a cult is Winona Ryder, who moved to the Rainbow commune in California when she was seven. Living with seven other families in the commune, Winona and her family had no electricity. This cult seems slightly more innocent than many of the others, and her family's intentions were to be self-sufficient and live off the land without any electricity, meditate, pray, and observe silence to encourage peace. Winona spent much time in the commune playing outside and using her imagination or reading, which isn't such a bad thing. However, she still had her personal freedoms and choices taken away, and as soon as she first saw a film screening, she knew that's what she wanted to do for a living. They left after three years in the commune.

14 Macaulay Culkin: Dad from Hell

Child star Macaulay Culkin had strict parents of a different type. Rather than trying to turn him into a conservative Christian, his father prepared him for stardom from a young age. Acting as his manager, Kit Culkin didn't give his son much of a choice, and put him up for a range of movie roles that were stressful for him to complete. Kit controlled Macaulay in other ways, and wouldn't allow him to defend Michael Jackson when he was charged with accusations, even though Macaulay had stayed with Jackson at his Neverland ranch and expressed a desire to come to his defense. Kit damaged Macaulay's career by making outrageous demands from the studios his son worked for, and had his children just about living in poverty when he spent all his money on lawyers to gain custody of his children and their earnings after getting divorced. Macaulay eventually got emancipated as a teenager, and got away from his dad for good.

13 Gwen Stefani: Parents Know Best

Fashion legend and musician Gwen Stefani is another star you wouldn't assume grew up with conservative parents, but you'd be wrong! Actually, the singer maintains that the only reason she never lost control as a young rock star is because she was worried about what her parents would think. She's looked back on her childhood since having her own children, and recalls to this day that it was her parents' severity which kept her out of trouble. “I was thinking today when I was driving, 'How am I going to make sure that Kingston never does anything bad and doesn't get arrested?'” she said. “I was thinking, 'How did I stay out of trouble?' And I know it's just because my parents are so strict. I mean, I'm still scared of them!” We suppose that a moderate amount of control and strictness can end up being really good for kids, especially if they're going to Hollywood!

12 Beyoncé: Singing Before Everything

Beyoncé is another celebrity who was raised by at least one parent who was very, very keen to see her succeed in the industry. When Beyoncé's girl band became Destiny's Child in 1993, her father Matthew Knowles put all the girls under a strict regime to turn them into pop royalty. Former Destiny's Child member LaTavia Roberson has confirmed that B's dad took things very seriously: “Matthew did not mince his words and it can be tough to take that kind of criticism when you are a little girl. We would try not to let it break us.” Matthew even quit his job to be a full-time stage dad, and forced the girls to do things like jog in the park while they sang, repeat dance rehearsals in the living room for hours, and even pray for the record deal they wanted. Destiny's Child did end up being wildly successful, but B has since fired Matthew as her manager.

11 Lady Gaga: Private School Girl

Most people wouldn't believe that Lady Gaga was actually raised by Catholics and even attended Catholic school, but she so did! Even from a young age and surrounded by rules that she was supposed to follow, Gaga had the urge to do things her own way, rather than copy everybody else mindlessly. “When I was young and I went to Catholic school-an all girls' school-we were told to pray to God and pray to Jesus, but I always prayed to women. I guess I always worshipped a more feminine force in my life and I didn't view God as having a particular gender,” she said. “I always either prayed to Mother Mary or Mary Magdelene, or to my father's sister Joanne who had died when he was a kid because I viewed her as an angel in the sky in the house of the Kingdom working alongside God. You know, watching over me.”

10 Brad Pitt: Southern Traditions

Today he's the most famous movie star in the world, but Brad Pitt comes from humble, strict beginnings. He was raised by Southern Baptists and described his father as being “very, very tough” to The Telegraph. He said that he and his siblings were moulded to have “all the Christian guilt about what you should and shouldn't do.” Despite growing up with strict parents, Brad maintains that he did have a happy childhood. However, he doesn't believe in using similar methods to discipline his own children. “I feel like my job is to show them around, help them find what they want to do with their life, put as many things in front of them, and pull them back when they get out of line, so they know who they are,” he said. His upbringing as a Christian led him to explore options beyond the church and discover himself in his own way.

9 David & Patricia Arquette: Life on the Commune

Glenn Close isn't the only Hollywood star to have grown up in a cult. Famous siblings David and Patricia Arquette grew up in the Virginian commune their parents began, where they stayed until the late 1970s. David was born in the Skymont Subud commune, whereas Patricia only grew up there, but the lifestyle impacted them both. Amongst other things, there was a lack of electricity and running water. Patricia opened up to Oprah about her childhood in February of 2011, telling her that her parents believed secluded religious life would help their family, as they both struggled with addiction. "[My parents] started it with a bunch of their friends, and they wanted to kind of build this utopian society," she said to Oprah. In the commune, David, Patricia, and their sister Rosanna were suffering domestic violence under their parents, which led David to start self-medicating when he was only a child.

8 Jessica Alba: Religious Relatives

Today Jessica Alba is widely regarded as one of the most gorgeous women in Hollywood, and we're not sure her modest Catholic parents are too happy with that. She confessed that she rebelled quite a bit against her parents, who tried to mould her into the perfect Catholic. She explained, “It's always been weird because I grew up in a very traditional, Catholic household. My parents were very strict but I broke away from that at an early age. I was a feminist when I was five,” she said. Though it would seem like Catholicism and Hollywood aren't a match made in heaven, Jessica does get along with her parents. “These days, I am much more liberal-minded but I still respect their beliefs.” As far as her image goes, she doesn't let her huge appeal bother her: “I don't really pay attention… at the end of the day, it's all a part of selling a product.”

7 Cuba Gooding Jr.: Christian Household

Actor Cuba Gooding Jr. has had quite a successful career, and you'd never have guessed that he was raised by strict Christian parents. His household was so traditional and conservative when it came to religious beliefs that even holidays like Halloween were censored to erase the non-Christian elements. “We were a very religious family. We grew up Christian and my mom didn't believe in goblins and stuff, so when we went to doors we'd come with these little afros and little bags. We'd be angels or firemen, whatever, but not anything from the 'pen of Hell,'” he said. “We'd knock on the door, and say, 'Happy Hallelujah Day.' She wanted Happy Hallelujah Day or she would whoop your a** for the grace of God. I was like, 'That's very contradictory, but okay. You're gonna beat us in the name of the Lord? Okay… '” Sounds like you didn't want to mess around with his mama!

6 Chloe Grace Moretz: Old Fashioned Discipline

Unlike a few other parents in Hollywood, Chloe Grace Moretz's parents kept a very close watch on her as she started acting professionally during her pre-teens. Though she was starring in movies at 13, something that other kids her age would not have been doing, she was treated the same way many other kids across the country are: with discipline and rules. Just like many other teenagers, Chloe was grounded and even had some of her favorite possessions taken away as punishment, even though she got up every day and worked on a movie set. “My mum makes sure I'm kept in my place; I just got my computer taken away. She's strict,” Chloe said when she was 13. Though that might have been annoying, we're sure this kind of strictness paid off! “I stay grounded through my family-my brother Trevor and my mom come everywhere with me,” she confirmed.

5 Glenn Close: Cult Life

Famous for bringing 101 Dalmatians' Cruella de Vil to life, actress Glen Close had a childhood marked by things much more frightening than a Disney villain. From the age of seven, Glenn was part of a cult known as Moral Re-Armament or MRA. Founded in 1938, the cult was intended to be an anti-war movement and supposedly centered around the principles of honesty, purity, unselfishness, and love. However, Glenn revealed that life in the cult meant she had to give up everything that was important to her and move to the MRA headquarters in Switzerland. As many cults are, MRA was very controlling. "You basically weren't allowed to do anything, or you were made to feel guilty about any unnatural desire,” she said, claiming that the cult dictated how she was “supposed to live” and what she was “supposed to feel”. She left MRA when she was 22, and is still struggling with its impact.

4 Kathy Griffin: Taught by Nuns

Comedian and actress Kathy Griffin isn't afraid to touch some pretty controversial subjects on camera, so it may come as a surprise that she grew up in an ultra-conservative, Irish Catholic family. She even went to parochial school! Surrounded by endless rules and strict standards, Kathy soon rebelled. "My parents sent me to Catholic school, which only made me the vehement militant atheist that I am today," she told L.A. Magazine in 2005. "Don't get me started about those priests. The nuns called me 'boy crazy'; don't you love that?" It seems that her strict childhood left Kathy with very strong feelings about the religion and devout Catholics like her parents, because she controversially mocked them on stage while accepting an Emmy for her show My Life on the D-List. "I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus," she said at the 2007 show, before being censored.

3 Rose McGowan: Nightmare Childhood

Another star who was born into a cult is actress Rose McGowan, perhaps most well-known for playing Paige Matthews on the hit show Charmed. Along with her family, Rose was involved with the Children of God until she turned nine. Her father was head of a chapter of the cult in Italy, where she was born. Today, she remains disgusted with how she was cut off from the world, manipulated into submission, and how the children of God viewed women. “Like in most cults, you were cut off from your [outside] family. There were no newspapers, no television. You were kept in the dark so you would obey… [Women] were basically there to serve the men… ” she told People. She has also revealed that men in the cult were allowed to have more than one wife. Thankfully, her father decided to leave the cult when he realized it could become dangerous for his daughter to be around.

2 The Jacksons: A House of Violence

Joe Jackson's name is now synonymous with stage dad and harshness, and he earned it. Though he's now apologized for the brutal way he raised his children, he was incredibly hard on both his girls and boys as they grew up. He admitted to Oprah that he beat his children with a strap, and has no regrets because he believed it kept them out of jail. He also revealed that he used to chastise Michael when he'd do the wrong thing, and thought his wife Katherine was far too easy on the children. La Toya Jackson today claims that her father was a womanizer and implied in her autobiography that there may have been other kinds of abuse from Joe. The Jacksons were raised as strict Jehovah's Witnesses and were isolated from other families, with the boys often forced to rehearse extremely hard. Many of the Jackson children have since forgiven their father for his ways.

1 Katy Perry: Too Many Rules

Katy Perry is the top celeb on our list who grew up with a much stricter upbringing than most would assume. The daughter of Christian pastors, Katy grew up with extreme rules, including a prohibition on many kinds of music and sayings. “I didn't have a childhood,” she told Vanity Fair, admitting that she wasn't allowed to say things like “deviled eggs” or “Dirt Devil.” She wasn't allowed to read any book but the bible, and was used to her parents speaking in tongues. “Speaking in tongues is as normal to me as, 'Pass the salt.' A lot of religions use meditation or chanting. It's a secret, direct prayer language to God. My dad speaks in tongues and my mom interprets it. That's their gift,” she said. We're not sure if Katy's mom and dad were trying to steer her away from the world of temptation with all those rules, but it didn't quite work!