A movie has been made about Johnny Depp’s defamation case against his ex-wife Amber Heard, and the film now has a streaming home. According to Variety, Hot Take: The Depp/Heard Trial is set to debut exclusively on Tubi, a free streaming service available to download on most smart TVs and other devices that offer streaming content options. The movie is debuting pretty soon too, with the streamer planning to launch it on Friday, Sept. 30.
Hot Take stars Mark Hapka (Days of Our Lives) as Depp and Megan Davis (Alone in the Dark) as Heard. The film is said to follow “the tumultuous relationship – in and out of court – of Depp and Heard, dramatizing the two-month defamation trial that concluded June 1, with the jury finding that Heard had defamed Depp by alluding to domestic violence allegations against him in a December 2018 op-ed piece.” Variety also noted that, while the jury found Heard guilty of defaming Depp, the Pirates of the Caribbean actor was also held “liable for a defamatory statement made about Heard by his lawyer.”
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Additional stars of Hot Take include Melissa Marty (Station 19) as Depp’s lawyer Camille Vasquez and Mary Carrig (Law & Order True Crime) will as Heard’s lawyer, Elaine Bredehoft. The film was directed by Sara Lohman (Secrets in the Woods), from a script by Guy Nicolucci (The Daily Show). Variety reports the movie was fast-tracked by Tubi and MarVista “to capture a timely take on a story that became part of the cultural zeitgeist, painting a unique picture of what millions watched play out in the headlines over the summer,” according to a statement from Tubi’s chief content officer, Adam Lewinson.
Hannah Pillemer, EVP creative of affairs for MarVista, added, Hot Take: The Depp/Heard Trial is one of many timely, culturally relevant original movies to come from our expanding partnership and slate of movies being produced in collaboration with Tubi. Connecting viewers to stories with this kind of social currency and topicality make watching them a must for any fan of pop culture or celebrity drama.”
The movie will debut just under four months after the end of the much talked about trial, which ended with the jury ruling that Heard defamed Depp in a 2018 Washington Post op-ed about domestic abuse, in which he was not explicitly named. Heard and her legal team stated that they planned to appeal the verdict, which they since have. Neither Depp nor Heard appears to have commented on the film about their legal battle.
