"House" was likely cancelled because of faltering ratings, but not because the star himself, Hugh Laurie, was getting tired of playing the crotchety doctor.

Laurie said quotes of him included in a recent New York Post story were old, and had nothing to do with Fox's recent cancellation.

"Some newspapers, obviously dissatisfied by the statement we released last week, have suggested that 'the truth' -- a modern journalistic shorthand for 'not even remotely the truth but it's creepy enough so let's go with it' -- behind our joint decision was that I was sick of going to work," Laurie said in a statement. "The evidence for this was remark I made five years ago about a different subject."

In the Post story, Laurie reportedly said that there are just a handful of things someone wants to do for 16 hours a day, every day, and that includes "sex and fine dining."

"It's not the playing the character over and over again," Laurie reportedly said. "It's the coming to work over and over again. You know, we have done 170 episodes now, I think. That's about 50 to 60 feature films worth.

"You want a break. You really do."

But now Laurie has a different take.

"Let me say unequivocally that I love my job, and work harder at it than most journalists work at theirs," he said. "As we explained in our press release, we were trying to preserve some of the character's mystique. We never wanted to overstay our welcome. Very possible, we could have continued with a re-worked formula -- House gets a job in a shoe shop and high jinks ensue -- but none of us could face that. We wanted to keep the band together and go out with as much dignity as we could muster."

The truth, however, is that "House" has really struggled in the ratings, especially this year. Through the end of January, "House" was averaging a 4.6 rating/7 share, according to Fast National overnight ratings from The Nielsen Co. That was good for No. 9 on Fox's schedule, and just inside television's top 50. But it's also a 20 percent drop from last year -- one of the network's biggest audience losses behind "Glee" (30 percent) and "Fringe" (27 percent). And "Glee" has iTunes sales to add to its luster.

These statements, however, still do not suggest that NBC Universal, which produces the show through one of its production subsidiaries, are shopping it around as being suggested. Although its ratings would still be one of the best on NBC if they were maintained in a move over there.

Fox airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET on Fox.