Johnny Depp Would Have Made $22.5 Million on ‘Pirates 6’, Per His Agent
Johnny Depp’s suit against his ex-wife Amber Heard continues to expose all sorts of details — or at least alleged details — from the two stars’ tumultuous life together. Many of these details involve their private life, like who (allegedly!) pooped in whose bed and why, but some of them also involve the practicalities of being one of the biggest movie stars on the planet.
Depp, after all, is suing Heard for $50 million in damages, claiming that her op-ed in the Washington Post alleging domestic abuse ultimately ruined his career. And while most people would have a hard time proving they missed out on $50 million in earnings because of one article, Depp’s legal team is trying to prove that $50 million is the kind of money he lost after Heard’s article and allegations became public, and Hollywood stopped casting him in major roles.
This week in the trial, for example, Depp’s agent and manager Jack Whigham testified in court that Heard’s article from December of 2018 caused “catastrophic” harm to Depp’s ability to make movies. He also claimed that Depp was set to make $22.5 million for a sixth Pirates of the Caribbean, but that the movie never happened after the negative attention surrounding Depp.
Whigham also testified that Depp made $10 million in 2017 for appearing in Kenneth Branagh’s Murder on the Orient Express and $13.5 million in 2018 for playing the villain in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald. After Depp lost a court case in England involving Heard’s allegations, Warner Bros. allegedly asked Depp to quit the franchise, which he did; he was replaced Mads Mikkelsen in the recent Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore.
During cross-examination, Heard’s lawyers got Whigham to concede that Depp never signed a $22.5 million contract to appear in a Pirates of the Caribbean 6. And it’s probably worth noting that the fifth Pirates, Dead Men Tell No Tales, grossed about half as much in the U.S. as the first movie had, and was the second-lowest grossing of all the Pirates movies worldwide. The franchise was already losing steam by 2018, in other words, regardless of Depp’s private life.
The Depp/Heard trial continues tomorrow; Heard and her lawyers have yet to present her side of the case.