How The Pandemic Was A 'Precious Gift' For Katie Holmes And Suri Cruise

Amid the stress and chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, actor Katie Holmes and her teenage daughter, Suri Cruise, were able to find a silver lining: each other. In a touching November 2020 essay for Vogue Australia, the "Dawson's Creek" star shared how she and her daughter made the most out of their time — and ultimately thrived — in quarantine. 

Holmes' relationship with her daughter, who she had with her ex-husband Tom Cruise in 2006, has always been remarkably close. As the only child of two Hollywood heavyweights, Suri was placed under a scrutinous public eye before she was even born. Speaking of her daughter's unique life to Glamour in April 2023, Holmes said, "What has been really important for me with my daughter, because she was so visible at a young age, is I really like to protect her."

Within the confines of isolated quarantine, Holmes found it even easier to focus on her connection with her daughter. "To live for a moment in time without the pressure of results and instead appreciate the natural rhythms of mother and daughter was the most precious gift," Holmes wrote in her essay.

The start of the COVID-19 pandemic ushered in a wave of new hobbies, interests, and obscene amounts of banana bread — and Katie Holmes and Suri Cruise's household was no different. In her Vogue Australia essay, Holmes described how she and her daughter entertained themselves during quarantine. The actress cited these "new hallmarks of satisfaction" as sewing, painting, writing, "and having had time at home to just be." 

And, of course, when there is plenty of time to kill, as was the case in 2020, Suri Cruise also had time to finally see her mom in "Dawson's Creek" as the smart, spunky Joey Potter. "I think it's probably weird since she's a teenager," Holmes told Variety in March 2023. "I'm not like, 'You need to watch Mommy's work.' But during the pandemic, we had a good laugh about it. It's wild to have a daughter who's almost the same age as I was when I began all this."

Holmes' preferred pandemic watches skewed less teen-soapy, choosing to dive into the film catalogs of Agnés Varda, Jacques Demy, John Cassavetes, and Ingmar Bergman. "Throughout this experience," Holmes wrote in her essay, "the through-line for me has been a heightened awareness of each moment and really taking it in and appreciating it."

Despite the tumultuousness of the COVID-19 pandemic, it's clear that it afforded Katie Holmes to put an even greater focus on raising and spending time with her daughter Suri Cruise, who turned 14 in the first year of the pandemic — and that's something Holmes has always worked to prioritize. "It's very important that I'm present and [Suri] has a stable, innocent childhood," Holmes told Town and Country in 2019.

"I feel so blessed to do what I do, but there's nothing in the world better than watching your child succeed," she continued. "Every day, kids get a little further away from you. That's a positive thing. They should be becoming more independent, but it's heartbreaking. You want them to stay with you forever, but they're these amazing beings, and you have to do everything you can to give them what they need — and then they're going to go." So, it's unsurprising that Holmes jumped on the opportunity to relish in quality time with Suri during the pandemic.

The mother-daughter duo's quarantine came at the cusp of Suri's entrance into teenhood, a particularly turbulent stage of growing up, offering a chance for Holmes to fully connect with the daughter who has grown up to be her actual mini-me, right down to flashing her signature smile.