Two weeks after Johnny Depp’s libel hearing, a subset of supporters arrived with a gigantic mobile reading of the Fathers4Justice ad, over a photo of the actor and his ex-wife Amber Heard: “Ditch the Witch.”
That these American celebrities are long divorced and had no children together, and that the case concerns the accuracy of a newspaper report in the SunIt did, in Fathers4Justice’s eyes, the perfect time to voice his disapproval of upcoming UK divorce law reforms. If Amber was, as they believe, mean to Johnny, then divorce shouldn’t be easier. Or something.
Although the connection between the divorce and Depp probably escapes almost everyone outside of the bitter Batman community, their confusion is understandable. If the men saw a perfect opportunity to pursue women, it was probably because Depp’s defamation case had already turned, courtesy of the superior court, into a small festival of misogyny. Although presumably his lawyers would want to take full credit for the way the actor’s concern for his good name has been reused as a demolition of his ex-wife’s reputation, they must have relied on the judge, Mister Judge Nicol, to accept that Focusing on Heard’s conduct was justified in a case related to Depp’s alleged violence (which he denies) towards her.
Heard told the truth about Depp? Wait: First of all, the court needs to know who defecated in the marriage bed, about Heard’s friends and lovers, how much he drank, what he did if he was not loving, if she or his sister. – She vomited Coachella and if she was, as suggested, a violent person. While the trial has yet to be issued, Depp’s defense team could hardly have made it clearer to those thinking of reporting domestic violence that they should first carefully consider any of their own unrelated transgressions and missteps, Any poor choice that could make an expert lawyer’s idea absurd.
Admittedly, the vivid detail demanded by the Depp team is also what provided a drama-starved nation with the compelling theater of the past two weeks. Just like the end of Michaela Coel’s TV drama I can destroy you coincided with an impending shortage of pantomime, the Depp show opened, offering, among its many distractions, scenes of doomed couples that sounded like a mix of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Look back in anger and the latest and bloodiest Amy Herzog, Belleville. What surely, given the origins of this legal action, has been an examination of the conduct of a character has been extended, presumably by some legally respectable process, to an eerie two-player game. Reports on this case should not, but repeatedly do, recall John Osborne’s ecstatic Kenneth Tynan review Look back in anger: “It shows us two attractive young animals engaged in competitive martyrdom, each with their teeth deep in the neck of the other and each reluctant to break the clinch for fear of bleeding to death.”
The contrast between the historical ranks and the teasing – “pumpkin head”, “Tasya van Pee”, “Amber Turd” – and the former couple’s refined manner in court has only added comedy to a drama with its origins in a restraining order and broader implications for victims of domestic violence. “When your aspiration is to be a great gentleman, to be a great southern gentleman,” Depp said, considering his behavior, “that doesn’t exclude you from the family of humans who have moments of frustration.”
It must sadden many fans of the southern knight to discover that he also does not exclude him from the family of humans who obsessively blame women for their misfortunes. And even those who agree with their legal team’s hint that unfortunate character traits could put a person beyond domestic abuse have reason to worry that regardless of the verdict, this trial has been more damaging to Depp’s reputation as a transitional act. Sun Article. Does it help your prospects of having supporters like the Ditch the Witch outfit and a lawyer, Adam Waldman, who tweets “in memoriam” alongside the names of the witnesses who displease him? After Cherie Blair was named a Heard supporter, Waldman tweeted, with a logic worthy of Fathers4Justice: “As Iraq could tell you, if the Blairs are involved, there could be no deception in the middle.”
You wonder if Waldman, with this sparkling approach to an alleged domestic abuse case, is aware that it is widely recognized as a serious crime, especially since the new violence numbers testify to horrific experiences at the shutdown. While Heard was testing, Refuge reported that calls and contacts were nearly 80% higher than usual in June.
Of course, it could be that by announcing his unpopularity with some prominent women, turning the spotlight on Heard, and thus inevitably turning a defamation case into a #MeToo sequel, the devilishly brilliant Waldman will help Depp to recover his identity as a southern gentleman and superimposes images of his client sleeping on the floor, or losing him in a kitchen, which this action has helped to spread. At the very least, he and Depp (from the unforgettable tray of stimulants with tampons) can be more effective as health educators than Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” anti-drug campaign. Rarely has decadence seemed like such hard or unrewarding work.
There is a short story by Muriel Spark, You Should Have Seen Disaster, in which a woman’s revulsion at disorder and dirt indicates her pathological detachment. Depp’s judgment is like the opposite: a trail of waste, breaks, and rooms stained with blood, trash, or food indicate a total detachment from reality, mainly from her unfortunate staff. Heard’s sister says of a trash: “In the afternoon it was cleaned, as if nothing had happened.” At this point in the case of Depp v News Group Newspapers, I am on the side of the cleaners.
• Catherine Bennett is an Observer columnist.
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