Rebel Wilson Wallops Backers Of Her Directing Debut ‘The Deb’ For Nixing Pic From Toronto Berth; Producers Call Claims “False, Defamatory And Disappointing” – Update
UPDATED with producers’ statement: The producer of Rebel Wilson’s The Deb have responded to claims Wilson made earlier Wednesday about their involvement in Australian musical movie, which is Wilson’s directorial debut.
“RW’s allegations are false, defamatory, and disappointing,” a spokesperson for the producers — who Wilson named in the video as Amanda Ghost and Gregory Cameron and executive producer Vince Holden — told Deadline later in the day. “Her self-promotional claims are clearly intended to cause reputational harm to the individuals who have supported her directorial debut film The Deb — a joyous movie that we’re very proud of and are looking forward to sharing with audiences. For her to promote a false narrative to advance her own agenda undermines the film and all the people who worked on this project.”
PREVIOUSLY, 8:46 AM: When you cross actress and first-time director Rebel Wilson, you better expect a Rebel yell. She has just dropped a video on Instagram hammering by name some of the backers of her directorial debut The Deb, who she claims prevented the film from making its world premiere as the closing-night film at the Toronto Film Festival.
This comes after Wilson singled out for scorn Sacha Baron Cohen over the 2016 comedy The Brothers Grimsby, in which he played a soccer hooligan who helps his secret-agent brother save the world. She played his wife. She was promoting her memoir Rebel Rising, and he denied her allegations. The threat of legal action prompted Wilson’s UK publisher to redact passages, and the chapter was removed when published in Australia.
You can watch Wilson express her disappointment over her Australian musical, as she levels some pretty serious charges against her backers. Here is the text of the words from Wilson:
“So you might have noticed that I did a post a couple, you know, like a week ago, about my film, the first film that I’ve directed that I’m so proud of The Deb, which is a little Australian original musical that is so cute, and it’s awesome that it got selected for closing night of the Toronto Film Festival, which is like … just you know, the best platform, and to be a first-time female director it’s just like, I mean, it’s huge. It’s massive.
So to have the joy of the movie being selected is one thing. But then to have the business partners that are involved in that movie turn around and say that no, the movie can’t premiere, is just beyond devastating.
Why are they saying this? Why are they stopping it from premiering at Toronto? Well, this dates back to October of last year, where I discovered bad behavior by these business partners. And let me just, you know, I just tell it how it is, so I’m just going to tell you who they are. They are so called producers of the film — I use that phrase very lightly. Their names are Amanda Ghost, and Gregory Cameron, and an executive producer who works with them called Vince Holden. So these are the people involved.
And so I said, reported, I guess you would say, their bad behavior when I found out not minor things, big things, you know, inappropriate behavior towards the lead actress of the film, embezzling funds from the film’s budget, which we really needed because we’re a small movie, you know? So kind of really important things.
Since I reported that behavior, I have been met with absolute viciousness and retaliatory behavior. So I’m there on set. I’m trying to film my movie with my gorgeous Australian cast and crew who are so amazing — shout out to all of you guys.
And yet every step of the way, these people who I complained about then tried to make my life hell. In the meantime, though, I still finished the movie. I made this great movie The Deb. And then now, you know, almost at the finish line. They’re saying, you know, it can’t come out. They might not release it, they might bury it. This is work of hundreds of people who have put their heart and soul into this. And this behavior is absolutely vile and disgusting. Now these people you know, Amanda Ghost in particular, has has a history of doing this kind of thing, mainly to music artists but also to people in the film business. So, the thing is, these people are forced to sign NDAs or, you know, otherwise threatened or bullied to not speak out.
As you guys know, I’m not like that. I won’t be threatened. I will speak the truth, and, you know, warn people about these people in the industry. Who are just not behaving ethically.
Yeah, so that’s my dilemma. If the movie doesn’t play at Toronto, it’s because of these absolute f*ckwits.”