Rebel Wilson fires legal team in film lawsuit as rival lawyers slam her 60 Minutes segment: court

Rebel Wilson has fired her legal team as she battles a lawsuit brought by the lead actor in a troubled film, with the younger actor’s lawyer slamming the Aussie star’s recent media appearances.

Actor Charlotte MacInnes, who starred in Ms Wilson’s film The Deb, is suing the Aussie star in the Federal Court over a series of social media posts allegedly made by Ms Wilson.

The young actor’s lawyers claim the posts imply Ms MacInnes lied by denying making a sexual harassment complaint against one of the film’s producers, Amanda Ghost, in return for a lead role in another of Ms Ghost’s productions, documents released by the court claim.

At the centre of the case is a swim at Bondi Beach in September 2023, with Ms MacInnes’ lawyers claiming Ms Ghost had a medical episode and Ms MacInnes had run her a hot bath at the producer’s penthouse apartment.

Ms Wilson claims the incident was “completely inappropriate and unacceptable” and that the young actor had made a complaint shortly after, which Ms MacInnes denies.

The Aussie star has now fired her legal team and is trying to get the Federal Court proceedings moved to the NSW Supreme Court, with defamation barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC branding the attempt “unusual”.

She submitted the matter should proceed “urgently”, asking for trial dates to be set as soon as possible.

“At the last moment when the case is ready for trial, merely because of the fact that (Ms Wilson) has elected to terminate her previous lawyers, we have new lawyers coming in saying ‘we’re not ready, and by the way we want to transfer the proceedings to the Supreme Court’,” Ms Chrysanthou said during a brief hearing in the Federal Court on Friday.

“That’s unusual.”

She claimed her client has “suffered” as a result of Ms Wilson’s behaviour over the last few months, arguing she had “defamed” Ms MacInnes during her 60 Minutes appearance in November last year.

“Ms Wilson has gone onto 60 Minutes, has defamed my client to a national audience within weeks of the first case management hearing, having told Her Honour that she was too busy to get her evidence done in a timely fashion,” Ms Chrysanthou claimed.

“These proceedings were called a ridiculous waste of time by Ms Wilson on national television.”

Ms Wilson’s new layer, Dauid Sibtain SC, rejected a claim his client had been “speaking in the media about this dispute”.

“I don’t accept that. I accept that … she appeared on 60 Minutes, that’s certainly the case,” Mr Sibtain said.

“Did she speak about Ms MacInnes?” Justice Raper asked.

“I haven’t seen the full broadcast of that. I don’t know, possibly,” he said.

Ms Chrysanthou pushed for the matter to be assigned to a different judge with more available dates, as Justice Raper indicated she had no available dates for hearing this year.

She said she and Ms MacInnes would be ready to run the case as early as Monday, saying to the court that the matter should be dealt with in court rather than “through social media and the media, which is how Ms Wilson has been conducting”.

However any decision on assigning the case to a new judge will not be dealt with until a determination is made on whether the case will be moved to the Supreme Court.

Bondi Beach swim at centre of case

Ms MacInnes allegedly showered and bathed with Ms Ghost at the producer’s apartment after a swim at Bondi in 2023, documents filed by Ms Wilson claim, with the Aussie star branding the alleged “sexual behaviour” as “completely inappropriate and unacceptable”.

Ms Wilson claims the young actor later told her the incident had made her uncomfortable, while documents filed by Ms MacInnes instead claim Ms Ghost had suffered a medical episode at the beach and she had run a hot bath for the producer as a result, with both of them remaining in bathing suits.

Ms MacInnes claims Ms Wilson lied by telling Ms Ghost the young actor made a complaint against her, with Ms MacInnes later telling the Aussie star she was not uncomfortable with what had unfolded, documents allege.

Ms Wilson claims the young actor lied by saying this.

Ms MacInnes’ lawyers further claim one of Ms Wilson’s posts implied the young actor supported people allegedly trying to block the film’s release in exchange for a record deal.

Ms Wilson has admitted to making some of the social media posts but denies they carry the defamatory meaning alleged by Ms MacInnes.