(UPI) -- Tom Cruise's libel lawsuit against Bauer Publishing, the company that owns Life & Style and In Touch magazines, has proved fruitful for gossip hounds. Leaked deposition papers from the suit are full of juicy tidbits about the 51-year-old actor's highly publicized split from his wife and his thoughts on how Scientology impacted his marriage.
Tabloids and gossip sites also seized on a particular exchange in which Cruise appeared to compare his film career with the plight of soldiers in Afghanistan -- which, if true, would have been pretty tone deaf.
"That's what it feels like," Cruise said when opposing counsel asked him about his lawyer using the Afghanistan comparison. "And certainly on this last movie, it was brutal. It was brutal."
But CNN's Jake Tapper pointed out Saturday that the quote that launched a flurry of indignant headlines was taken out of context.
Here's the actual exchange, via CNN:
"Now your counsel has publicly equated your absence from Suri for these extended periods of time as being analogous to someone fighting in Afghanistan," opposing counsel asks him. "Are you aware of that?"
Advertisement"I didn't hear the Afghanistan," Cruise replies. "That's what it feels like and certainly on this last movie it was brutal. it was brutal."
"Do you believe that the situations are the same?" Cruise is asked.
"Oh come on," Cruise says, "you know, we're making a movie."
"Headlines stating he equated his job with those in the military are demonstrably false. They are a distortion of what is provable and on the record," the Oblivion actor's attorney said in a statement.
"Tom is a staunch supporter of our troops and does not feel that making a movie is even remotely comparable to fighting in Afghanistan and said so in plain English," he added.
