Colin Farrell might not deny anyone 15 minutes of fame. It's his own 15 minutes of infamy the actor has a problem with.
The Website DirtyColin.com, purporting to sell footage from an explicit sex tape Farrell made with former Playboy Playmate Nicole Narain, was shut down Tuesday for violating a court order blocking release of the 15-minute video.
DirtyColin.com was inaccessible for much of the day, presumably due to heavy traffic after word spread via the blogosphere that the controversial tape was available online. Another Website, IDontLikeYouInThatWay.com, posted what it claimed were video stills of the Alexander star and his then girlfriend in action.
"Colin tried to stop us from showing you this," the latter site wrote. "Well, here it is anyways." Later in the day, the site amended its post to say that the video was no longer available.
The footage, selling for $14.95, was apparently removed at the behest of the Farrell camp.
"A Website attempting to distribute an unauthorized tape of Colin Farrell was shut down today," the Irish actor's publicist, Danica Smith, said in a statement. "Mr. Farrell will take legal action against anyone who tries to distribute this tape."
There was no immediate comment from Farrell himself, who recently completed a stint in rehab for an addiction to painkillers.
The battle over the sex tape's release dates back to last July, when Farrell filed a lawsuit against the former Miss January to block her from releasing the supposedly salacious footage. A judge subsequently granted the actor a temporary restraining order to block distribution of the X-rated romp.
In his filing, Farrell claimed he willingly made the tape but with the understanding that it was for private viewing only.
Narain, however, had other ideas.
She partnered with online porn purveyor Internet Commerce Group and tried to convince Farrell to sign off on releasing the tape.
"I didn't expect it to be public," Narain said during a November appearance on MSNBC after a snippet of the tape had started making the rounds online. She went on to argue that she and Farrell should take "control" of the situation and make available the full footage for mutual profit, as it was sure to be leaked anyway.
"It's in our best interest," Narain said.
As for how the footage first leaked, Narain was mum.
"We both had a copy," she told MSNBC. "I'm not going to say I haven't had numerous parties."
David Hans Schmidt, the Phoenix-based agent and celeb porn broker named in Farrell's initial lawsuit, and Sal Abbate, the Internet Commerce Group mogul who was working with Narain, denied that they had anything to do with the tape's unauthorized release Tuesday. (DirtyColin.com was registered by a "John Taylor" and operated from a server in Coral Gables, Florida.) In fact, both men seemed equally incensed over the leak--if for altogether different reasons.
"We could have gotten as much as $50 for [each copy of] this," Abbate told the New York Daily News. He also reiterated that Farrell and Narain could "control" the situation by jointly releasing the sex tape.
"Instead of chasing phantoms, we should come together and form a joint venture," Abbate said. "Let's beat these SOBs."