Johnny Depp Defamation Suit To Be Televised
We're all going to get a front row seat!
While following the ongoing drama of former married couple Johnny Depp and Amber Heard, have you ever found yourself thinking, “well, I wish I could see all of this insanity in realtime?” Well, wait no longer. Depp’s long-brewing defamation suit against is going to be televised on Court TV.
According to Deadline, the Johnny Depp defamation case against his ex-wife Amber Heard is scheduled to begin next Monday, April 11, in Fairfax County, Virginia. Court TV will be providing the televised feed of the proceedings. The network will also provide coverage of their pool of anchors and correspondents, including Ted Rowlands, Ashley Willcott, Chanley Painter, Vinnie Politan, Julia Jenaé, Michael Ayala, Joy Lim Nakrin, and Julie Grant.
In 2018, Amber Heard wrote an op-ed for the Washington Post in which she alleged Johnny Depp had abused her during their marriage. She never actually names Depp in the story, but she wasn’t married to anyone else between 2015 and 2017 as far as anyone knows. Depp responded with a $50 million defamation suit which is finally going to see the inside of a courtroom.
The trial is gearing up to be something of an ensemble production. Along with representatives from Warner Bros and Disney, a few famous names are scheduled to take the stand. The witness list includes billionaire Elon Musk, WandaVision star Paul Bettany, and DCEU’s Aquaman actor Jason Momoa.
Of course, there’s no way to know whether it will be Johnny Depp or Amber Heard who’s happier at the end of the trial. This isn’t the first lawsuit Depp has brought to bear in relation to his ended marriage, and the last one worked out pretty poorly for him. In November 2020, as Deadline reported, Depp lost his libel case against the British tabloid The Sun who he sued for libel after the paper referred to him as a “wife beater.” That loss was quickly followed by the actor being removed from the Fantastic Beasts film franchise in his role as the villain Grindewald. The roles made available to the star have since grown scarce and the U.S. release of his most recent film — 2020’s Minamata — was delayed for a couple of years. He seems to be just now sneaking his way back onto the big screen, having been cast in the French director Maiwenn’s upcoming film about Louis XV.
In the meantime, Amber Heard hasn’t seemed to have much trouble at all continuing to land roles, though some argue she should. In January 2020, the Daily Mail released audio recordings of an alleged therapy session in which Heard seems to admit to physically attacking Johnny Depp on a number of occasions. The recordings turned a lot of Heard’s supporters against her leading to, among other things, fan campaigns to get her fired from the role of Mera in DC’s cinematic universe. Far from being fired, Heard reprised the role briefly in last year’s Zack Snyder’s Justice League and will appear in the upcoming Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.
