Rebel Wilson grilled over ‘champion of women’ claim in blockbuster defamation trial

Rebel Wilson has been grilled for describing herself as a “champion of women” as she takes the stand in her blockbuster defamation trial.

The Australian actor also denied suggestions that she “mistreated women” during the making of her film The Deb.

Ms Wilson’s co-star in the film, Charlotte MacInnes, is suing the Hollywood star over a series of social media posts she alleges implies that she walked back a sexual harassment complaint against one of the film’s producers, Amanda Ghost.

Ms Wilson travelled from the US to be present for the trial, sitting in the witness box for nearly an entire day of cross-examination by Ms MacInnes barrister, Sue Chrysanthou SC, on Tuesday.

She maintained when asked by Ms Chrysanthou that she still agreed with part of her affidavit read out to the court which states: “I regard myself as a champion of women and believe that my commitment to The Deb is an illustration of this”.

“You are not a champion of women at all, are you?” Ms Chrysanthou pressed.

“I think if you look across my 25-year career you can see many evidences of me supporting women, promoting women. If you like I can go into detail about that,” Ms Wilson replied.

She denied ever mistreating Ms MacInnes and Ms Ghost, responding “that’s nonsense” when Ms Chrysanthou submitted that she had “bullied” the women.

Rebel denies ‘smear’ site claims

Ms Wilson also denied allegations she ordered the crisis PR firm she hired to create “take down” websites about Ms Ghost, with one of the sites posting unfounded allegations the producer was the “Indian Ghislaine Maxwell”.

The actor rejected submissions she and her former US lawyer, Bryan Freedman, “conspired” with the PR firm The Agency Group (TAG), to publish the sites about Ms Ghost.

She rejected suggestions by Ms Chrysanthou that she was being “utterly dishonest” and had “lied about this topic for over a year”.

She maintained Mr Freedman had hired the publicist to “work on my case” and not to work on her behalf.

The court was previously shown a screenshot of the metadata of draft copy of what would be published on the attack sites, which listed Ms Wilson’s production company Camp Sugar as the author.

Ms Wilson said anyone could have put that her company modified the document but was unable to explain beyond that on Tuesday.

Rebel’s claim on wife’s Dory post in court

The Bridesmaids star claimed an Instagram post made by her wife, Ramona Agruma, last Friday was a pregnancy meme, and was not “mocking” the evidence of Ms MacInnes.

The Instagram story contains an image of Dory from Finding Nemo and is captioned: “I suffer from short-term memory loss … or do I? I can’t remember.”

“I felt as though she was mocking the evidence that I gave,” Ms MacInnes told the trial on Friday morning.

Ms Wilson on Tuesday told the court she believed her pregnant wife was instead poking fun at “pregnancy brain”.

“When I saw it I just assumed she makes a lot of funny memes and posts about having pregnancy brain … so I assumed it was about pregnancy brain,” Ms Wilson told the court.

“I thought it’s interesting that (Ms MacInnes) thought it referred to her.”

Ms Chrysanthou appeared exasperated through much of Ms Wilson’s evidence on Tuesday, at one point telling the Hollywood star “I’m not asking for War and Peace” while pressing for a simple yes or no answer.

‘Worst thing’: Rebel’s claim on alleged complaint

Ms Wilson claims the younger actor told her she felt uncomfortable following a bath she shared with Ms Ghost in the producer’s Bondi penthouse in September 2023 after Ms Ghost allegedly suffered a medical episode during a sunset swim at Bondi Beach.

Ms Wilson described the alleged complaint as the “worst thing that could have fallen into my lap” in court on Tuesday.

“I took it that MacInnes was confiding in me. I was pretty shocked by it,” Ms Wilson told the court.

“I had a very friendly, professional relationship with Ms Ghost and I took it as a sexual harassment complaint.

“I’ve worked for years on this movie, we’re weeks out from shooting — and this is such a fun, girl power movie, and the worst thing that could have fallen into my lap at that point is a sexual harassment complaint.”

The Hollywood star alleges Ms MacInnes later withdrew the complaint to score a lucrative record deal and a role in another of Ms Ghost’s productions.

Ms Wilson aired the claims in a series of Instagram posts described by Ms Chrysanthou as “slagging off” the young actor during the first week of the trial.

Ms MacInnes denies making a complaint and told the court that she “never” said the bath made her feel uncomfortable.

Ms Wilson was whisked away to an awaiting car outside the Federal Court by a security guard when proceedings finished on Tuesday.

She will return to the witness box on Wednesday.

Rebel Wilson has been grilled for describing herself as a “champion of women” as she takes the stand in her blockbuster defamation trial.