Rebel Wilson slams ‘vulture journalists’ for destroying reputation

Rebel Wilson yesterday slammed a group of ‘vulture’ Bauer Media journalists who she alleges destroyed her reputation.

Rebel Wilson arrives at the Victorian Supreme Court yesterday. Picture: AAP

Australian actor Rebel Wilson yesterday slammed a group of “vulture” journalists working for Bauer Media, who she alleges destroyed her reputation by publishing articles based on false ­information from an obsessed former school mate who wanted to “make a quick buck”.

At the actor’s defamation trial in Melbourne’s Victorian ­Supreme Court, Wilson was in tears as she told the jury she felt targeted by women whose objective was to sell magazines.

“I feel like they are a bunch of women who don’t know me. They did not try to contact me or my family, I just feel so distraught about why those women orchestrated an attack on me. I feel very hurt by it,” she said.

“If it was their daughter or their cousin that made it big they would not be doing it.

“To ruin my reputation when I have worked so hard at this point for 17 years every day.”

Wilson says she developed eczema, a stress rash and a urinary tract infection in the days following the release of the articles, which she said resulted in a “media-storm”.

“Everything that could have gone wrong physically went wrong and a doctor had to be called to set because there was obviously something very, very wrong with me,” she said.

In the following months she struggled to get hired. “I thought there was maybe something weird with the industry right now but gradually started to ­realise my reputation had been severely tarnished,” she said.

“The first big indicator was when I was fired from my job on Kung-Fu Panda 3, it was the first time I’ve ever been fired in my life and an extremely traumatic experience.”

Wilson became upset again as she recalled reading a piece written by journalist Caroline Overington for The Australian Women’s Weekly in 2015.

It contained the line: “I didn’t ask for a death certificate (for her father). I would like to think we live in a world where I wouldn’t have to ask for one.”