Again, for the benefit of his eager beaver legal team - conjecture, gossip, rumour, not to be taken seriously, all in good fun…because we do love your client, ok? We love him for his heterosexuality and his heroism, both of which are so potent, it would be pure folly to say otherwise. Praise Thetan, ah-Xenu. 

So. You know it's bad when the Wall Street Journal - the WALL STREET JOURNAL! - gleefully proclaims the end of your career. And such is the fate of embattled Tom Cruise who is, for the first time in years, without a major movie production deal, clearly no longer the slamdunk box office fairy we once knew and still hate. 

Me.On the floor.Risky-Business-dancing my Chinese arse off. The Goddess is good, non? Not that this came as a surprise or anything. Remember the Parade interview? And all the speculation preceding the MI:3 release in May? Paramount has been nervous for a year. Paramount has been waiting to can his tight ass since The Couch. Paramount finally made the smart business decision and cut his sh*t loose. But the best part is - the Chairman of Viacom, the studio"s parent company, pretty much publicly slapped him upside the head! 

Said Mr. Sumner Redstone: "As much as we like him personally, we thought it was wrong to renew his deal. His recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount." 

Obviously, Mr Redstone is not a Scientologist. What"s worse…obviously the Scientologists are not too happy. Even though Camp Cruise is working to spin these recent developments as a decision that works in their favour - something about pursuing new business models and creative funding options - most Hollywood analysts see this as a colossal setback, one that could silence his mission forever. The problem for Tom though goes beyond professional interests. For years there have been suggestions that the Church expects an exorbitant annual donation from its members, some say as high as 30% earnings, and given the lucrative relationship that"s flourished for so long between Cruise and his religion, you have to wonder just how worried the mother ship is right now considering they could be facing a rather steep decline in his contribution. Which is why I've been told that they've been ALLEGEDLY encouraging him to do more endorsement work overseas, especially since the little f&cker has been supposedly hoarding away untold millions for the last several years through Japanese promotions. But I digress. 

The point is they are currently reworking the plan, channeling their energies towards other opportunities to milk out his 40s, biding their time before they can hopefully invest in a new high profile hunk to ride into the future. Like vermin and virus, the Church will always prevail. For now though, I wouldn't jump to conclusions quite yet about a scientological severing of ties. You don't get to be an Omega 3000 or whatever they call their high ranking officers without some measure of loyalty and protection. 

Catch me on eTalk tomorrow with some juicy dirt on how Brad Pitt fits in to all of this.