If you’re just now looking in on the media circus that is the Johnny Depp-Amber Heard defamation trail, here are the basics: Heard divorced Depp in 2016; she also received a restraining order against him. In 2018, she wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post talking about her experience with domestic violence. She didn’t mention Depp by name, but Depp sued her for defamation and is asking for $50 million in damages. She’s countersuing and asking for $100 million.
The trail has gone on for weeks and still has a ways to go; it’s been incredibly ugly, but one quick look at Twitter will tell you that public opinion is most definitely on Depp’s side. He sued Heard for allegedly defaming him and damaging his career, and indeed, he has been dropped from several movies since; see how Mads Mikkelsen replaced him as dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald in the Fantastic Beasts series. But seeing the outpouring of support for Depp online, I have to wonder if producers aren’t considering casting him in stuff again, regardless of whether he wins in court.
For instance, Pirates of the Caribbean producer Jerry Bruckheimer talked to Variety about whether Depp could eventually return as Jack Sparrow. “Not at this point,” he said. “The future is yet to be decided.” Hey, that’s not a firm “no.”
A sixth Pirates of the Caribbean film is happening, but we don’t know if Johnny Depp is in it
In the meantime, Bruckheimer and company are looking to make a sixth Pirates film with Margot Robbie. “We are developing two Pirates scripts — one with her, one without,” he said. Now, if you ask me (you didn’t, but I’m telling you my opinion anyway), the first Pirates movie is the only one that’s any good and it’s all been downhill since 2003. But the last two Pirates movies with Depp — 2011’s On Stranger Tides and 2017’s Dead Men Tell No Tales — both made over a billion dollars at the box office, so we’re getting a new Pirates movie sooner or later, with or without Depp.
As for the defamation trial, closing arguments are scheduled for May 27. There’s no telling how long after that the jury might deliberate before we hear a decision.
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