The hunky actor dispatched his attorney to Los Angeles Superior Court Monday, asking a judge to yank the August issue of Playgirl from newsstands nationwide. The magazine, which features the actor on the cover, contains 10 unauthorized nude Pitt pics.
Pitt's lawyer, John Lavely Jr., told Judge Robert O'Brien that the photos in the glossy were illegally snapped by a trespassing paparazzo as the Sexiest Man Alive spread out while vacationing with ex Gwyneth Paltrow in the West Indies in 1995.
Lavely asked for a temporary restraining order that would force Playgirl to halt distribution of the issue and recall all copies currently on the shelves. The request was part of a lawsuit filed by the actor. He is seeking unspecified damages for invasion of privacy and infliction of emotional distress.
Playgirl's lawyers countered by saying the pictures are two years old and have been published on the Web and in European tabloids. "We did not commission or take the photographs," Kent Raygor said.
He told O'Brien the shots are "famous" and that The Nude Pictures of Brad Pitt site has received 750,000 hits since posting naked images of the actor in full-frontal glory. (Based on a quick perusal of the site's five photos, which feature the 32-year-old beefcake doing some sort of naked calisthenics on a tiled floor, we can see why Pitt wanted the restraining order.)
The judge issued his ruling this afternoon, granting Pitt a partial victory. O'Brien ordered Playgirl to halt distribution of the August issue, but he stopped short of calling for a complete recall, meaning all magazines now on shelves will stay there. The judge can extend the order during a July 29 hearing.
This is the second time this year Playgirl has gotten into trouble with celebs who prefer keeping themselves under wraps. Back in January, the magazine ticked off Antonio Banderas and his crack legal team after printing what it said was a nude photo of the actor snatched off the Internet. The Banderas camp claimed the image was a digital fabrication and threatened legal action.
Raygor wouldn't say how the magazine obtained the Pitt photos, though.