Tom Cruise swaps diapers changing for UK premiere

U.S. actor Tom Cruise uses a news photographer's camera at the London premiere of the film 'Mission Impossible III' at the Odeon Cinema in Leicester Square in London April 25, 2006. (Toby Melville/Reuters)

LONDON - Tom Cruise put off seeing his newborn daughter to attend the British premiere of his new action film, "Mission: Impossible III," on Tuesday.

The Hollywood actor had been due to return to the United States to see his bride-to-be Katie Holmes and baby Suri, but decided instead to stay in Europe for a publicity tour.

Wearing a black suit and shirt and dark glasses, he made one of his customary extended walkabouts in London's Leicester Square. He posed for pictures, chatted to fans and signed autographs for four hours.

"I talked with Katie and she said 'go'," he told Reuters Television. "I realized that there would be people who'd be disappointed if I wasn't going to come."

It is Cruise's third outing as the American agent Ethan Hunt in the spy thriller based on the 1960s television series. The film takes him from Shanghai to the Vatican City.

Part of the film was shot in Rome, the city where Cruise and Holmes, known in tabloid shorthand as "TomKat," first made their romance public.

At his last premiere in London, Cruise was squirted with a water pistol by a bogus TV reporter working for a comedy show.

The man used a fake microphone to spray the actor as he chatted to journalists before the UK premiere of "War of the Worlds." A flustered Cruise grabbed the man and repeatedly called him a "jerk."

On Tuesday, Cruise laughed off the incident, saying he had no fears of being doused again. "I love it here, it didn't change anything," he said.