La Toya Jackson scene cut from Bruno

Sacha Baron Cohen has made an 11th hour cut to Bruno, to edit out a scene that poked fun of La Toya Jackson and indirectly, her late brother Michael Jackson.

As news of Michael Jackson's death broke on Thursday in Los Angeles, Bruno's creators realised that a classic 'gotcha' scene featuring LaToya Jackson, Mexican labourers and a running gag about the King of Pop's telephone number, would go down like a proverbial lead balloon at that evening's LA premiere.

Director Larry Charles told Variety at the time that the cuts were made out of respect to the Jackson family, and that he, Sacha Baron Cohen and distributor Universal would decide whether to leave it out permanently. Unsurprisingly, they've since deemed it uber-unfunny and have opted to leave it out indefinitely.

The film is set to premiere in Sydney tonight.