Risky Business At Viacom

Actually, this follow up on the 'South Park' dust up is being posted just because it is great to see Tom Cruise as a 'South Park' character - love it!

Excerpts from E! Online via Yahoo News -

"The Closet," the Controversy--and Cruise
By Joal Ryan Fri Mar 17, 8:49 PM ET

"Trapped in the Closet," a South Park episode featuring a literally closeted Top of Form
Bottom of Form Tom Cruise and a primer on Scientology, was abruptly pulled from Comedy Central's schedule, and replaced with a nearly eight-year-old chestnut spoofing the Bottom of Form Sundance Film Festival.
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Cruise, a Scientologist who has staunchly defended his religion and an avowed heterosexual who has successfully sued people and publications that have suggested he is in the metaphorical closet, was pegged as the culprit in the South Park switcheroo in a report Thursday on HollywoodInterrupted.com.

The blog reported that the star "threatened" to sit out the publicity cycle for Mission: Impossible 3--presumably meaning no interviews, no photo-ops, no Oprah couch--if "Trapped in a Closet" aired again on Comedy Central.
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This is not the first time Cruise has been linked to the closing of "Closet." In January, Britain's Sun reported the episode would "never" air in the United Kingdom because TV executives there were "scared [Cruise] will sue." (The episode apparently aired without incident in Canada a few days later.)

This also isn't the first time Comedy Central has been accused of caving. Last December, a Catholic rights' group took credit for the network pulling reruns of South Park's Virgin Mary-skewering ninth season finale, "Bloody Mary."
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Comedy Central would not say if "Trapped in the Closet" will reair at a later date, or if it will be included in South Park's syndication package.

Video clips from the episode, including the bits with Cruise and the closet, and Stan and the Scientologists, can be found on the Comedy Central Website.

In a bit of timing that is said to be coincidental and not at all related to the "Closet" controversy, South Park begins its 10th season next Wednesday.

NOTE: Comedy Central and Paramount Pictures are owned by Viacom which is set to release the new Tom Cruise movie - "Mission: Impossible 3"

- Censorship Is A Risky Business -