Verne Troyer spoke to E! News about the sex tape his ex girlfriend has been shopping around. He’s been fighting its release and says his lawyer is great but it’s been expensive for him. Verne says that he broke up with Ranae Shrider right before she decided to go public with the tape and he suggests she’s doing it for revenge. He also confirms that they’re still living together and says that Ranae was just taunting him the other day. The story she told News of The World about having to rescue him after he nearly drowned in a bubble bath is false according to Verne.

“I feel like I have no privacy. Just because people are seeing something that was meant to be between me and her. That’s the biggest reason that I’m, you know, trying to stop the tape from being released.”

The diminutive actor says he feels “betrayed and hurt” by the release of the tape, and he denies all involvement in its release. Troyer and his attorney Edwin McPherson succeeded last week in upholding an injunction to prevent the sale of the tape while they try to shelve the issue entirely.

“I’ve been, for the past two weeks, three weeks probably, spending a lot of money to fight this. I have my lawyer and he’s doing a great job,” Troyer said…

“I broke up with her in the middle of June; it was something probably to do with that. It was basically when she decided to give the tape away. I highly doubt that she thought that would get me back with her. Ransom or something,” Troyer said.

And what of claims made by Shrider, like that she nearly drowned the Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me star in a romantic bubble bath?

“There’s no incident like that. She’s coming up with things and telling media anything to make it interesting. I haven’t seen everything she’s done…The things she says just aren’t true,” he adds…

“She’s still in the house,” Troyer says, noting that he’s taking legal action to force her out, but their situation “makes it even harder, to, you know, not strangle her…

“I saw her when I left today and she was calling me names and stuff. Uh, so I can’t get away from it,” he said, choking back tears.

Troyer says friends, family and attorney are helping him pull through the mess, but that the embarrassment “has already started affecting [work opportunities].”

[From E-Online]

You can tell the guy was really betrayed by this woman and that he’s hurt by it. He’s not my favorite person and I didn’t like the way he behaved on The Surreal Life, but no one deserves to go through that.

Troyer also talks about Heath Ledger’s death. He worked closely with Heath on his last movie, The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus. Troyer confirms statements from other cast members that it was a difficult shoot and that it was cold and a lot of the actors were sick from filming. He says Heath was troubled in his personal life, he’s not going to say exactly what it was about because he doesn’t want to betray their friendship, but that his death was an accident and Heath wasn’t about to take his own life. He told a funny story about how Heath taunted a paparazzo that was trying to shoot him.

Verne and other cast members have the same heart tattoo for Heath. It’s of a drawing the late actor made.

“I don’t believe that he was troubled,” Troyer says of Ledger’s final days working on the movie. “Everyone knew that he had a hard time sleeping and from working in the cold weather in London—we were out in the rain and things like that—so everybody got sick, to a certain extent…

“He couldn’t sleep because he was so wrapped up in the character of Joker in Batman,” Troyer said. “He was still going through not sleeping because he was so involved in that. Throughout our shoot it was the same way.”

Troyer insists that despite sleeplessness Ledger was still “upbeat” about his work on Parnassus. Playful even, as Troyer recalls the last time he and Ledger were together: On the cast’s final night of shooting before they departed London for hiatus, the pair shot a scene at a bar where paparazzi loomed out front. Ledger made his way into the crowd unseen to tease the shutterbugs.

“Heath snuck his way out into the crowd without anybody noticing and came right up next to one of the photographers and asked him, ‘Who are you trying to shoot? Who are you trying to get?’”

The photog said he wanted a snap of Ledger, to which Ledger responded, “’Oh, really? That’s cool,’” according to Troyer. By the time the pap could realize it was Heath himself, the actor had disappeared.

“I thought that was classic, just classic and hilarious,” Troyer said.

Troyer, who was visibly choked up during our sit-down with him, said he valued Heath’s confidence in him.

“There were things in his life going on and I don’t want to say anything about it because it was personal and he trusted me…anybody would have been a little bit depressed [in Heath’s existing situation],” Troyer said

Troyer maintains, however, Ledger would never commit suicide.

“He wasn’t, for me, depressed enough to even think about taking his own life. It was an accident, it happened and it’s very unfortunate.”

On a brighter note, Verne and other castmates like Lily Cole were able to pay homage to their costar and friend. They tattooed themselves with replicas of a heart Ledger drew on a piece of paper. Troyer, who got his on his right hand, considers it a memorial.

“A lot of people from the cast and crew got a tattoo of it somewhere, of that heart, just thinking of Heath and respecting him.”

[From E! Online]

It’s surprising to hear that Verne knew Heath. He touched a lot of people and his accidental death was a real tragedy. Heath had a few tattoos himself and even had one for his daughter, Matilda. It was a heart with her name on it that he had done on his chest about a year before he died.

Heath Ledger is shown on 9/2/05 at the Venice Film Festival. Credit: Graffiti Press / PR Photos. Verne Troyer is shon on 6/3/08. Credit: Jody Cortes / WENN

What relationship is complete without a sex tape? If you follow the Paris Hilton school of thought, practically everyone’s made a sex tape or two, famous or not. So by that logic, Verne “Mini-Me” Troyer and ex-girlfriend Ranae Shrider are perfectly normal.

Troyer sued TMZ to get his sex tape taken off their website; however a judge ruled they could put it back up because Shrider gave TMZ permission to post the tape – and the camera used to make the video was hers.

Shrider just gave an interview to AVN about their relationship, how she and Troyer met, and how they came to make a sex tape. Here are a few excerpts:

Shrider - who grew up in Kentucky and attended the University of South Florida before moving to Hollywood in July 2007 to pursue an acting career - said she and Troyer met on New Year’s Eve 2007 at a party at the Playboy Mansion. “I was totally not in my element there,” she said. “A friend I was with said, ‘Let’s go over there and meet Mini-Me.’ I was hoping to meet someone like Ian Ziering, but hey.” Shrider said Troyer asked her for her phone number several times, but she said he asked several other girls for theirs, too. She said she eventually gave in and gave him her number, never expecting to hear from him.

“The next day, he called and told me it was his birthday,” she said. “I was like, ‘Um, well, happy birthday.’” Shrider said the relationship progressed through phone calls during Troyer’s three-week stay in England while filming The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. When Troyer returned to the U.S. on Jan. 23, Shrider said, the two met up and began a full-fledged relationship.

As for the sex tape, Shrider said, the couple had been dating for several months when they decided to document their intimate moments during a romantic getaway. “Neither of us had ever done anything like that before,” she said. “We thought, ‘Why not?’ We were in a beautiful setting, and we thought it would be something good for our personal use.”

However, Shrider insisted, filming sexual romps was not a normal activity for the couple. A lot of their life was “all about normalcy,” she said. On more than one occasion, they discussed marriage, she added, but the relationship soured in June. They still live together, but they lead separate lives with separate bedrooms and try to be “civil to each other.”

[From AVN]

Ranae of course claims she’s not trying to cash in on her 15 minutes of fame, and says if she were, we would have heard about her “months ago.” Okay… but since she revealed that she gave permission for TMZ to show the sex tape, wouldn’t that indicate that she is trying to become famous? Otherwise, shouldn’t that tape have ended up in a fire?

I find it crazy that she and Verne are still living together. That’s got to be awkward. According to In Touch, they’re staying in separate rooms while waiting out their lease. Something tells me that’ll be a tense few months.

Here’s a video clip of Ranae’s interview with AVN. The video content itself is sorta-SFW, but the ads preceding the video are a little racy. And there are some nude images hanging behind Shrider during the interview. The other content on the page is NSFW.

Here are pictures of Ranae Shrider with Verne Troyer. They appear to be her own private pictures, which I’m assuming she sold to AVN, since they have the rights to them. They are SFW, but the ads on the page are NSFW. Thanks to AVN for the images, where they have many more.

We all know that Verne Troyer (aka Austin Powers’ “Mini-Me”) is suing TMZ.com, Kevin Blatt (the man responsible for Paris Hilton’s sex tape), and a few others for $20 million over the sex tape that Troyer claims was stolen from him and posted online.

A commenter here on our site backed up this claim.

“I think this is so sad! This girl [Troyer’s sex tape partner Ranae Shrider] is a sad little girl from Kentuky [sic] that called me the night the video went missing. [Troyer’s] new manager was badgering this poor girl. She left for work came back and he was there and it was missing. I think its a sick publicity stunt that will ruin what little reputation she has left to ‘make it’ in Hollywood. She really thought she was in love. And now what she thought was real is become dirty and grotesque.”

[From Celebitchy comments]

Oh, please. Call the WAAAAHHHHbulance.

WELL! It turns out that the 39-year-old, 2 foot 8 inch actor’s girlfriend Ranae Shrider signed a declaration filed in federal court stating the tape was created with her video camera and she gave permission to TMZ to air it, thus prompting the judge to allow TMZ to reinstate the post featuring mini-scenes of the tape.

We would post it here but we received a cease and desist order from “his people” stating it’s a violation of his privacy and attached a copy of a temporary restraining order which prohibits us, et al from the exhibition, display or broadcast of any portion of the video on the internet, television, or any other medium. Click here to see it directly.

Now then; Mini-Me has been going around bragging that his “me” isn’t so “mini.” When the Tampa, Florida MJ Morning Show spoke with Ranae, she said:

“This is all I’m going to say: As previously reported on interviews made by him, it is definitely not a tripod.”

[From Stuff.co.nz]

After the radio show host asked Ranae if Troyer is “proportionate for a man of 2ft 8in?” Ranae responded with a resounding “Yes.”

Okay, first, I didn’t need that visual to be supported or denied, thanks for that to both the MJ Morning Show and Ranae. Secondly, I guess we’ll see what “powers” the Austin star has after TMZ Productions, Inc., Sugar DVD, and Kevin Blatt appear in court on July 7th.

Here’s Verne Troyer and Ranae Shrider at the MTV Movie Awards June 1st. Header of Verne at the Palms Place Hotel and Spa Grand Opening in Vegas on May 31st. Photographer: Judy Eddy. Images thanks to WENN.

At first, it seemed like he’d leaked the sex tape himself, but now it looks like “Mini-Me” Verne Troyer prefers to keep his bedroom activities private after all. The actor is seriously pissed at TMZ and is suing the site for posting stills and clips from the tape earlier this week.

Verne Troyer has filed a $20 million lawsuit, claiming TMZ violated his rights by publishing and airing portions of his sex tape.

In the suit, filed today in U.S. District Court in downtown L.A., Troyer claims TMZ violated his privacy rights and infringed on his copyright and trademark by running portions of the tape on TMZ TV and TMZ.com. He also alleges TMZ violated his right of publicity and misappropriated his name and likeness.

Troyer says the tape was stolen and ended up in the hands of Kevin Blatt, the guy who distributed “One Night in Paris.” Blatt is also named as a defendant.

In addition to damages, Troyer wants an injunction prohibiting further dissemination of the video.

Calls to TMZ were not returned.

[From TMZ]

No word yet on who may have stolen the tape. It sounds like Verne might be hanging out with some less-than-trustworthy people these days- and that person knew just where to go with a sex tape. Meanwhile, TMZ might be getting sued, but it’s not stopping them from finding out more about Verne’s co-star in the tape. Apparently she’s a 22-year-old aspiring model from Kentucky who really thought Verne was in love with her. Poor kid.

Picture note by Celebitchy: Verne Troyer and his sex tape co-star are shown at the MTV Movie Awards on 6/1/08. I bet he broke up with her and she’s the one who released the sex tape and all the personal photos to TMZ.

I couldn’t watch it. I could barely even watch the stills. Verne Troyer, who rose to fame for his role as Mini-Me in the Austin Powers movies, is the subject of a recently leaked home porn video. It might not be the creepiest celebrity sex tape ever - Tom Sizemore definitely wins the prize for that one- but it’s still pretty disturbing.

Yes, that’s Mini-Me Verne Troyer in a sex tape shot with his former live-in girlfriend at the couple’s apartment. A third party has snatched up the tape and although no deal has been made, we hear dealer Kevin Blatt, who brokered the deal for Paris’ video, is entertaining a $100k offer from SugarDVD to distribute the nastiness. We would have thought the tape was worth at least ONE BILLION DOLLARS.

[From TMZ]

Verne was recently a guest on Howard Stern’s radio show and reinforced his reputation as a ladies’ man, claiming that he has had sex with Playboy Playmates, and has participated in 3-ways. Perhaps this video was his way of backing up those claims. Or, maybe the release of the tape is supposed to drum up interest in “The Love Guru,” the sagging Mike Myers movie which Verne co-stars in. All I know is, I would never pay to see this. In fact, I might pay someone to make it go away. Forever.

Note by Celebitchy: I watched this, and the segment TMZ has on their website is just Verne and this hirsute-looking woman making out. I also had a gut reaction that urged me not to press play. No offense is meant to little people with that, there’s just something gross about Troyer and I’ve felt that way ever since I saw him on The Surreal Life. The guy peed in the corner one night and greedily pawed Adrienne Curry’s boob’s when she did that human sushi table thing. He just bugs me and I have no interest in seeing him have sex. If you’re intent on seeing this, it’s at TMZ’s website. The clip is SFW.

Update by Celebitchy: Pictures removed by lawyerly request

Verne Troyer, best known as “Mini-Me” in the Austin Powers movies, has been hospitalized. The diminutive actor, who is currently cast in Terry Gilliam’s new movie “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” which co-starred the late Heath Ledge and now features both Johnny Depp and Colin Ferrell, was battling flu symptoms on the set and was hospitalized for dehydration.

Actor Verne Troyer, best known for his role as “Mini Me” in Austin Powers, was rushed to the hospital today, Usmagazine.com has learned.

A source close to Troyer, 39, says the actor was experiencing “flu-like symptoms” while shooting The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Heath Ledger’s last movie) in Burnaby, British Columbia.

Adds the source, “He’s been working really hard on the film. They just wanted to hydrate him.”

A rep for Troyer denied that he was treated for a drug-related problem.

“Verne is fine and doing well and is back to work,” the rep tells Us.

Troyer checked into rehab for alcoholism in 2006.

[From Us Weekly]

My question: what the hell kind of weird-ass movie is this, that stars Johnny Depp, Tom Waits, Christoper Plummer…. and Mini-Me? I do hope Verne is feeling better soon, and whatever he’s dealing with goes away. Every time I see him, I can’t help but think of when he appeared on the reality show “The Surreal Life,” and would get blackout drunk to the point that Peter Brady would have to carry him around like a baby and put him to bed.

Note by Celebitchy: Heath Ledger fell ill while shooting that same movie, and the star Terry Gilliam said of Heath’s illness before his death that “We all caught colds because we were shooting outside on horrible, damp nights. But Heath’s went on and I don’t think he dealt with it immediately, even when he was taking antibiotics. I think what he had was the walking pneumonia.”

Now that two actors have fallen ill, do you think they might improve working conditions?

Verne Troyer is shown with “actresses” Tina Holloway and Tiffany Jordan at the Fuse TV Party for the Grammy Awards on 2/7/08, thanks to PRPhotos.