While Brad Pitt's large family with Angelina Jolie continues to make headlines, Pitt's ex-wife, actress Jennifer Aniston, is combating a rumor that she's pregnant.

Her rep has denied the rumor, which claims that Aniston's on-again-off-again beau John Mayer is the father. But there's more subterfuge at play when it comes to the Aniston rumor mill.

"Every time Brad or Angelina is in the news, and it's a story that's so exclusive only one outlet really gets the story, the natural reaction is to come up with a story about Jen to combat the attention," says one magazine editor.

Does that explain the stories about a possible Aniston-Mayer wedding at the same time that Pitt and Jolie were about to bring their twins into the world?

"Absolutely. Brad and Angelina don't have people around them leaking or saying things that maybe a reporter wants to hear. They live in a bubble. There's little to work with," says the editor. "But Jen? She dates, she's out and about, there's more material there, and everyone wants to see that she's OK."

One twist in the current story, however, is Aniston's recent means of battling the pregnancy rumors.

"Usually she just left it up to her rep (to deny), if he even felt the need to respond," the editor says. "But now she did lunch at (popular Hollywood eatery) the Ivy in a tight shirt? I mean, the Ivy? Usually Jen is above that sort of thing. She obviously knew she'd be photographed there. It makes you wonder if all of this press — hers and Brad's —is starting to get to her."

As for Pitt, he recently taped the Nov. 18 episode of "The Oprah Winfrey Show," where he reportedly discusses life with Jolie and their six children.

Courtney Hazlett 

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Dog days for Aniston

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Though she stars alongside a canine companion in her upcoming film, “Marley & Me,” Jennifer Aniston’s not exactly a dog person. In fact, in an interview with the Los Angeles Times, the actress admits the presence of a pooch almost put her off the story all together.

After finding three copies of the best-selling book on which the film was based under her Christmas tree last year, Aniston didn’t even want to read it.

“I thought, this isn't a book I'm going to sit down and read, because it's got a dog on the cover,” she confessed. “I don't know why I had that weird prejudice against it.”

The prejudice seeped over to the “Marley & Me” script she later received, which Aniston said inspired little more than an “Uck, a dog movie” reaction before she gave it a second chance.

“It's so much more than a dog movie," she now says. "It's this beautiful portrait of a marriage and this 15-year span between these two people and this sweet little unconditionally loving creature that sort of walks through it with them.”

But her dog woes were back in full force once she met her canine co-star. Aniston added, “I walked onto the set and put my sweater and my bag down on the couch, and that dog leapt up onto the couch, grabbed my sweater and started ripping it!”

Ree Hines

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