Grim reality behind decision in Johnny Depp, Amber Heard defamation trial

The court may have ruled in Depp’s favour – but the damage done to both their careers after weeks of excruciating testimonies is significant.

The jury may have ruled in Johnny Depp’s favour over Amber Heard, but after six explosive weeks in court (and a previous and similarly bruising trial in 2020), the truth is that both parties have emerged with significant damage.

In fact, it’s difficult to imagine how either Johnny Depp or Amber Heard’s careers will ever fully recover, after dozens of testimonies laid bare seemingly every excruciating detail of their tumultuous marriage.

It wasn’t helped by the fact that an audience of millions lapped up every new allegation, with the trial streamed live and watched obsessively around the world.

To recap for those that somehow missed one of the biggest celebrity court cases ever: Heard, 36, was sued by her ex-husband, Depp, 58, for $US50 million ($A67 million) for implying he abused her in a 2018 Washington Post op-ed that she wrote. Although she did not name him in the piece, Depp claimed her allegations were false and cost him lucrative movie roles.

Heard then countersued, demanding $US100 million ($A134 million) and claimed she suffered “rampant physical violence and abuse” at her ex-husband’s hands.

Depp was ultimately victorious in court, with the judge ruling that Heard had “acted with actual malice”.

Heard was ordered to pay Depp US$10 million (A$14 million) in defamation compensatory damages and US$5 million in punitive damages after the jury decided she “acted with actual malice.”

However, Fairfax County Circuit Court Judge Penney Azcarate reduced the punitive damages the jury awarded Depp to US$350,000 (A$487,000), the state’s statutory cap, making his total damages US$10.4 million (A$14.49 million).

The jury did agree with one aspect of Heard’s claim — that she was defamed by Depp’s lawyer when he called her abuse allegations a hoax — and awarded her US$2 million (A$2.78 million) in compensation and $0 in punitive fees.

This trial was the second well-publicised court showdown to delve into the details of the A-list former couple’s relationship.

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Depp waved at fans outside court during the trial. Picture: Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images/AFP

Heard speaking to her lawyer inside the courtroom. Picture: Evelyn Hockstein/Pool/AFP

Depp (unsuccessfully) sued News Group Newspapers (NGN) – publisher of The Sun – in 2020 for libel over an article that called him a “wife beater”, published two years earlier.

He denied the claim he had assaulted Heard, but the paper argued the article was accurate.

Over three sensational weeks, which spawned thousands of headlines worldwide, Heard and Depp went head to head with their own accounts in court before a judge eventually ruled in the publication’s favour.

So with two explosive trials and weeks of extremely personal testimonies from both sides now wrapped up, what could possibly be next for Johnny Depp and Amber Heard?

‘Difficult’ Depp no longer a leading man

After being dropped from two massive franchises – Fantastic Beasts and the Pirates Of The Caribbean – and with his last movie released more than two years ago, there’s no doubt Depp’s spiralling career has hit a crisis point.

Depp’s movie star status had been on a downswing since his legal battle with Heard began.

Even without the brutal violence allegations levelled at him by his ex-wife, there were plenty of other reasons raised as to why Depp’s reputation took such a hit in recent years.

During the trial, an executive from Disney, the studio behind the Pirates franchise, testified in court that she never saw any missives from within the company referring to Heard’s op-ed. Depp’s longtime agent, Tracey Jacobs, also testified that the star was an exceedingly “difficult” client who had “fundamental anger issues” and drew multiple complaints from film crews on “virtually every movie” he worked on.

And there are not many new offers on the horizon, it seems.

Depp was forced to resign as Grindelwald in the Fantastic Beasts franchise. Picture: Warner Bros

His time as Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean is now over, too.

In November 2020, after losing his libel case against The Sun, Depp announced on Instagram that Warner Bros had asked him to “resign” from playing Grindelwald in the third Fantastic Beasts film.

“I have respected and agreed to that request,” he wrote.

In a far cry from the peak of his fame, the last studio film Depp had starred in prior to that was Fantastic Beasts 2, back in 2018.

His most recent film, Minamata, in which he plays American photojournalist W. Eugene Smith, received only a meagre theatrical release after being shelved for a year. Since then, his work has mostly consisted of voicing a character on web series Puffins Impossible.

Depp will next appear in Jeanne Du Barry, a French-language film in which he plays King Louis XV, but after his huge court victory, it remains to be seen how the once-movie megastar’s future will play out.

Perhaps the biggest question among Depp fans is whether or not he will ever reprise his beloved role of Captain Jack Sparrow in the Pirates franchise.

Producer Jerry Bruckheimer left the door ever so slightly ajar, saying in early May: “Not at this point. The future is yet to be decided.”

Heard’s career ‘stopped’ after Aquaman

Regardless of the court’s decision, it’s been widely expected for some time that Johnny Depp has little chance of ever fully resurrecting his A-list Hollywood career – but the jury’s still out on what impact these legal wars will have on Amber Heard in the long run.

During the trial, entertainment industry consultant Kathryn Arnold testified that Heard’s career had already suffered due to the court cases brought by Depp, and that – despite her solid performance in Aquaman – she had to beg for a role in the sequel due to the ongoing bad publicity.

“I was given a script and then given new versions of the script that had taken away scenes that had action in it, that depicted my character and another character, without giving any spoiler aways, two characters fighting with one another, and they basically took a bunch out of my role,” Heard said. “They just removed a bunch out.”

Heard and Aquaman co-star Jason Momoa. Picture: Warner Bros

Not only did Heard eventually wind up with a dramatically “pared-down” appearance in Aquaman And The Lost Kingdom (her on-screen time is reportedly only about 10 minutes) but the picture painted by her legal team indicates that new film offers haven’t exactly been flooding in.

While on the stand, Ms Arnold explained that Heard’s “work stopped”, at a time when she should have been “on the precipice of a meteoric rise” after the hugely successful Aquaman.

She stated that Heard would have earned $US8 million ($A11 million) from endorsement deals, $US20 million ($A28 million) from movies, and millions more from TV shows had Depp not defamed her.

“It’s very likely that Ms Heard should have earned between $45 and $50 million over that time period,” Ms Arnold told the court.

“It was that moment where not only was she a good actor, but she was now world-renowned because she was in the most successful film … for DC Comics. It was just this extraordinary moment for her, for her career to take off … Even though she may not have been at the stature of a (Spider-Man star) Zendaya at that time, you can still look at it as a comparable trajectory of what happens when you’re in a blockbuster movie.”

In 2023, Heard will appear in two movies: In The Fire and Run Away With Me.

The actress claims her career has been impacted by the ongoing legal battles with her ex-husband. Picture: Jim Watson/Pool/AFP

Perhaps most forebodingly for Heard’s film future is the fact that not only did Depp win in court, but he was also well ahead in the court of public opinion on social media.

Comment sections on media stories have been flooded with the viral #JusticeForJohnnyDepp hashtag, while TikTok recorded 15 billion views for the hashtag.

In comparison, #IStandWithAmberHeard content garnered 8.2 million views.

The online vitriol directed at Heard over the course of the legal battles would certainly be a red flag for movie companies, the expert explained.

But by that same token, Depp is clearly also high-risk.

“When there’s negative social media it can be very bad, because not only can social media be directed at the actor or the actors themselves, but it can also be directed towards the movie, towards the movie company, towards the product that the actor or actors are working with.”

It’s hard to predict exactly how Depp and Heard’s careers play out in the years to come, but there can be no doubt that this drawn-out legal war has made certain there were no real winners.