Strip club paid Zeta 'compliment'

Ms Zeta Jones filed the lawsuit last week

A topless club being sued by actress Catherine Zeta Jones has said the actress should be "flattered" it used her image in a promotion.

Ms Zeta Jones is suing The Spice House, of Reno, Nevada, and its owners, for putting her picture on its website.

She filed her complaint on Thursday in the US District Court in Los Angeles.

Club owners said they did not know the photo was the actress but were "having fun" with the issue. One dancer has named herself Catherine Ta-Ta Jones.

She is a big double-D and we are just B cups. She ought to pick on someone her own size Kent Wallace, The Spice House

Ms Zeta Jones, who won an Oscar for her role in Chicago, said the club used her image alongside those of partially nude women.

She said it gave a wrong idea that she "endorsed sexually explicit content".

The lawsuit said Ms Zeta Jones had never been to The Spice House and did not want her "highly valuable image and persona" to be used as an endorsement.

Kent Wallace, spokesman for The Spice House, said his web designer got the photo from a "royalty free" website without recognising it as Ms Zeta Jones.

"It was an image of a beautiful woman," Wallace said.

"We had no idea it was Catherine Zeta Jones, one wouldn't think her image would appear in a free graphics website.

"She should have been flattered, as far as I'm concerned."

'Shocked'

Mr Wallace said the club immediately took down Ms Zeta Jones' images when it was contacted by her lawyers.

He called the lawsuit "frivolous".

"We are just shocked and bemused by this," Wallace added.

"She is a big double-D and we are just B cups. She ought to pick on someone her own size."

Ms Zeta Jones is seeking unspecified damages and an order barring further use of her likeness.