Paramount Pictures is terminating its 14-year relationship with actor Tom Cruise who used to be a pure box-office phenomenon and is now a pop-culture punch line, according to a report published late Tuesday in the Wall Street Journal.

"As much as we like him personally, we thought it was wrong to renew his deal," Viacom Inc. Chairman Sumner Redstone told the paper in an interview posted online. "His recent conduct has not been acceptable to Paramount."

Last year, Cruise seemed to experience a public relations fiasco, though his megawatt-smile facade was still appealing; jumping up and down on Oprah Winfrey's couch to declare his love for the actress Katie Holmes; criticizing Brook Shields for taking antidepressants to treat postpartum depression and speaking out publicly against psychiatry and for his religion, Scientology.

Paula Wagner, the actor's longtime partner in his movie company, Cruise/Wagner Productions, struck back at Redstone, calling his comments about the three-time Oscar nominee "offensive" and "undignified."

Moreover, Wagner insisted that she and Cruise chose to leave the Paramount lot and establish a new venture financed through a private, revolving equity fund of 100 million U.S. dollars.

Editor: Donald