Cruise gives his sister the boot

Never work with family they say. Well Tom Cruise’s days of breaking that golden rule are over.

Cruise has ceased using his sister Lee Anne De Vette as his publicist and called in the big guns of Hollywood firm Rogers & Cowan – specifically veteran PR Paul Bloch – to help shore up a once-impregnable image that has been badly dented by Tom’s manic declarations of love for Katie Holmes and Scientology-backed slamming of psychiatry. De Vette had assumed the role 20 months ago after Cruise parted ways with his long-time spin maestro Pat Kingsley.

Public relations expert Ann Gabriel was not surprised by Cruise’s “restructuring” after the star experienced his biggest box-office hit ever with War Of The Worlds while suffering one PR disaster after another, sparked by his sudden relationship with fiancée Katie Holmes. “If he's truly happy with his life there were probably ways he could have better chosen to portray his newfound happiness,” Gabriel said, name-checking the Cruiser’s couch-jumping display on the Oprah Winfrey Show. “He understands that he may have overstepped some of those boundaries.”

De Vette has been demoted – sorry, reassigned – to the position of promoting Cruise’s charitable work. “Lee Anne has done a wonderful job on behalf of me and Cruise-Wagner Productions over the last few years,” Cruise declared, “but she has always expressed a desire to oversee and expand the day-to-day activities of my charitable endeavours.” Everybody’s happy then.