Chapter 1: What is the defamation case involving Rebel Wilson and Charlotte McInnes about?
I'm Ruby Jones and you're listening to 7am. It's a case where the art has been overshadowed by the drama. The star of Australian film The Deb, singer Charlotte McInnes, is suing Australian actor and director Rebel Wilson for defamation. Over two weeks of hearings, the court was told about smear campaigns, hacked Snapchats and the central claim that Rebel Wilson lied about her star actress.
Rebel is accused of being a fantastical liar who orchestrated a complete revision of history. She maintains she's telling the truth and that she's a whistleblower who supports women. A judge is deciding on which version of events is true with a decision expected any day.
Chapter 2: How did the film The Deb lead to legal disputes?
Today, senior reporter at The Daily Telegraph, Nathaniel Cooper, on the trial, the movie and the consequences for everyone involved. It's Thursday, May 14. So, Nathaniel, this story begins with a film called The Deb, which I've heard is a musical comedy written and made here in Australia. So to begin with, can you just tell me a bit about the film and how it came about?
Well, interestingly for the Deb, it actually began as a stage production at the Australian Theatre for Young People. And I think its first production was in 2023, 2022, somewhere around there. It's written by an Australian writer, performer, comedian, glamazon, Hannah Riley.
Chapter 3: What were the initial signs of trouble during the production of The Deb?
She was coming to court every day. And one of our favourite things was what's Hannah going to wear today?
I was inspired to write The Deb after an encounter that I had with a teenage debutante at schoolies week in a sort of semi-rural surf town in northern New South Wales.
So she wrote this musical comedy called The Deb. It premiered in the Rebel Theatre at the Australian Theatre for Young People. Rebel saw it and loved it and decided to turn it into a film.
I don't have a Deb day and I need one if I want to go. I'll get you a date.
Chapter 4: What are the main claims Charlotte McInnes is making against Rebel Wilson?
The air is thick with masculinity. The unmistakable mask of Lynx Africa.
And then in September 2023, they began formal pre-production of the film and that collided with so many matters that are before the courts at the moment.
Okay, so what was the first sign then that there was some trouble on the production?
There are a couple of things happening at the same time in September 2023. One of them was a dispute between Hannah Riley and Rebel Wilson over the writing credits. Rebel wanted a writing credit for the film. That went into arbitration with the Australian Writers Guild. There was also some argy-bargy over the budget with the film's producers.
So there were some items that appeared in the budget that Rebel wasn't happy with.
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Chapter 5: What evidence was presented during the trial regarding the interactions on set?
And then on the 5th of September, 2023, Amanda Ghost, one of the producers of the film, and Charlotte McInnes, who was playing the lead role of Maeve. Charlotte was staying with Amanda in an apartment in Bondi. And after some studio sessions that day in the early evening, they went for a swim at Bondi.
And Amanda suffers from a medical condition where she has a strong reaction to extreme temperatures. So extreme cold in this case, she got out of the water and had an anaphylactic reaction as she describes it. So they went back to the apartment. They were in their swimwear. Charlotte helped Amanda into the shower while she ran a bath.
Then on Charlotte's telling of the story, she jumped in the bath because she was cold. Amanda couldn't warm up.
Chapter 6: How did Rebel Wilson respond to the allegations made against her?
So she jumped in the bath as well, still wearing their bathing suits. And that began a whole range of issues. The next day, Rebel says that Charlotte complained to her that she felt uncomfortable when she was asked to have a bath and a shower. Charlotte says that she never complained and she was never uncomfortable.
And that's the genesis of the court case that just wrapped up on Friday here in Sydney.
The rising Aussie star suing Hollywood celebrity Rebel Wilson for defamation has finally shared her side of the story in court.
Charlotte McInnes today grilled over... OK, and so tell me more then about what Charlotte McInnes is saying is defamatory. What's the case she's making?
So about 12 months after the film finished shooting, Rebel began putting posts on Instagram.
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Chapter 7: What impact could the trial's outcome have on both Rebel Wilson and Charlotte McInnes?
There were a whole range of them, and they contain a number of what Charlotte's team says are defamatory imputations. Basically, their case is that she painted her out to be a liar who changed her story about the complaint in order to gain benefit for herself. And they also say that Rebel's posts painted her as a woman for sale.
She's been seriously affected by this according to what she said in court and in her affidavit. She said that she's been unable to sleep, she's been unable to eat. She also hasn't had any acting work since these posts were made. The Great Gatsby premiered before Rebel made these posts and she hasn't had any acting work since then.
Rebel's team say that there's no way of knowing whether she would have got any acting work anyway and she also did sign a recording deal prior to all this happening and she's continued releasing singles.
OK, so across that two weeks of hearings, tell me a bit more about what's come out about interactions on the production.
So the first week of the trial was mainly Charlotte's witnesses, including Charlotte herself. And so we heard from Hannah Riley, who spoke about the atmosphere on set, which didn't sound particularly good. Charlotte broke down in tears at least once, to my memory, when she was talking about how difficult it was to be a round rebel character.
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Chapter 8: Why did The Deb not perform well at the box office despite positive reviews?
Suka Santhu, the barrister representing Charlotte, painted Rebel as a bully who paints herself as a champion of women, but instead she has bullied and harassed Charlotte McInnes. She said that she's bullied and harassed Amanda Ghost, the producer at the centre of the Bath incident, and that she's bullied and harassed Hannah Riley.
So Rebel, in the first week, was in court the first day of the hearing, but didn't come back into the court again until she had to give evidence.
And then in the second week of the hearing, when it was her chance to give evidence, she said that she's never bullied or harassed anyone.
She said that she is a truth teller and she's known as a truth teller.
Sue Chrysanthou put it to Ms Wilson that she mistreated a number of women involved in the Deb. But Ms Wilson replied, I don't believe I've ever mistreated a woman and there were no complaints ever raised against me on the Deb or any time in my 25-year career.
And Rebel Wilson is saying that Charlotte did make the complaint that she was doing what any person in her position would do when a young actress said she was made to feel uncomfortable by a senior person on the film, the producer, the creative producer, but also attached to the finance of the film.
So Rebel said in court that this was a nightmare situation for her to be in, to hear this complaint, and then she had to do something about it.
While Charlotte's team tried to paint her as a liar, particularly in the closing arguments on Friday last week, you know, Sukrasanthu did take the court through all the times that Rebel's evidence didn't necessarily match up, times she's contradicted herself or times she introduced new things that she'd never said before.
Despite having put multiple posts on Instagram, despite being involved in multiple different cases around the world related to this film, there was new stuff introduced during her evidence that we'd never heard before.
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