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(Photo: Reuters/ Stefan Wermuth)Tom Cruise is enjoying being back on top at the North American box office with Mission:Impossible - Ghost Protocol.
Tom Cruise's attorney Bert Fields has blasted the parent company of controversial tabloid the National Enquirer over its latest cover story, which suggests that that actor is a "monster" who "abused" his ex-wife Katie Holmes.
Fields, who is believed to have handled Cruise's recent divorce settlement from Holmes, excoriated American Media, the publishers of The Enquirer, for the "disgraceful and lurid" article about Cruise's marriage to Holmes, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
"Your cover announces, as a fact, that 'THE REAL TOM CRUISE IS A MONSTER.' Mr. Cruise is certainly not a 'monster.' He is a caring father, a hardworking actor and, above all, an honest, decent man," Fields wrote in a letter to American Media.
The article in question runs the headline "Inside Tom's House of Horrors" alongside a picture of Cruise's Beverly Hills residence, and the article suggests that Holmes' marriage to Cruise was "a living nightmare."
It also contains allegations that Holmes, 33, led a "tortured life" with the "Rock of Ages" actor, which prompted her June 28 divorce filing.
Holmes, who was raised Catholic, reportedly ended her five-year marriage to Cruise, a devout Scientologist, out of concern that the actor would ship their 6-year-old daughter Suri off to a radical Scientology organization known as the Sea Organization.
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Sea Org is composed of adults and minors who have committed their lives to the volunteer service of their religion, and various ex-members have blasted the organization and its practices as being unhealthy, according to TMZ.com.
This has led to widespread media scrutiny of Scientology and Cruise's involvement with the religion.
Fields claims that the article will cost Cruise "hundreds of millions of dollars of professional and personal damages, for which we intend to hold American Media, and everyone who participated in the perpetuation of this scurrilous attack, jointly and severally liable."
"Mr. Cruise's home in Telluride, like his home in Beverly Hills, is a pleasant and loving home," Fields wrote, adding that "Suri was not forced to stay for five months in a tiny windowless room. She spent most of her time with Tom and Katie. She slept in a nursery adjoining their bedroom. It has a window."
Fields went on to threaten legal action if the Enquirer does not "retract each and every one of your false allegations about Mr. Cruise with the same prominence and emphasis as you gave your original false and defamatory assertions."
He specifically threatened to "call the Court's attention to your long record of printing and publishing malicious lies about celebrities in order to enrich yourselves at their expense."
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