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Less than a week after winning a defamation suit against his ex-wife Amber Heard, Johnny Depp seems ready to restart his career.
British guitarist Jeff Beck announced during a concert in Gateshead, England, that he will release a new album with the 58-year-old actor, who was by his side on stage.
The announcement came amid widespread public coverage of the six-week trial, during which Depp alleged that 36-year-old Heard defamed him by calling her a survivor of domestic abuse in a 2018 Washington Post opinion piece. The jury awarded Depp $ 15 million in damages and $ 2 million to Heard for defamatory comments made by Depp’s attorney, Adam Waldman, in a Daily Mail article. Legal experts have described the verdict as a decisive victory for Depp, and fervent online fans celebrate it as such and others regret it, seeing the loss of Heard as a sign that the #MeToo movement is losing strength.
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Beck and Depp’s album, which will be released in July, could indicate a quick attempt to relaunch Depp’s career. During the trial, Depp said Heard’s allegations had damaged his career and caused Disney to remove him from “Pirates of the Caribbean 6”. “The best is yet to come and a new chapter has finally begun,” he said in a statement after the jury returned its verdict.
The publicity surrounding the trial could help Depp restart, said Eve Ng, a communications professor at Ohio University and author of “Cancel Culture: Critical Analysis.” I bet there are people who don’t even I would have looked at this album, but now it will say, “I’m going to go out and buy it just to support it,” Ng said.
This process could be more difficult for Heard. He has appeared in several films such as “The Rum Diary” and “Pineapple Express”, but wrote for The Post. a comment friends and advisers told him would be blacklisted for allegations against Depp (not featured in the piece). While starring in “Aquaman,” she wrote that she had to struggle to keep her role in the sequel and attributed it to “anger at the women who talk.”
“She can’t win,” Ng said. “If he hides and waits for it to explode, then people who think he deserves all the horrible reaction he received will have won.… But if he tries to do a project like Johnny Depp did, his detractors will say, ‘Oh, just he’s trying to make us forget his terrible behavior. ‘”
After the verdict: confusion, euphoria and, for a few, disappointment
Heard, who accused Depp of physical violence, lamented the outcome of the case. His lawyer has said he will appeal the decision. “It hurts me that the mountain of evidence is still not enough to deal with my ex-husband’s disproportionate power, influence and dominance,” Heard said in a statement.
Depp’s turn in music is not a total surprise. Although he is best known for acting in films such as “Pirates of the Caribbean”, “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” and “Alice in Wonderland”, he dropped out of school before his career in Hollywood. to become a musician. He played in the short-lived rock band “P”, which sometimes featured performers from the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Sex Pistols. He has since collaborated with Oasis, Iggy Pop and Marilyn Manson, among others. In 2015, she formed “Hollywood Vampires” with Alice Cooper and Joe Perry of Aerosmith.
At the show in England last Thursday, Depp bowed during Beck’s announcement and said he and Beck had met five years earlier and “they haven’t stopped laughing since.” Depp has made several appearances on stage during Beck’s current tour and the two released a single together in 2020.
It makes sense for Depp to try to restart his career after the favorable verdict, said Sarah Kovoor, professor of University of Colorado Denver Business School researching crisis management. But he should be careful, he said.
“You have to be very careful not to switch from victim to bad,” he said. “He has to show that this is not just a public relations stunt, which is something he’s been working on for a long time. He has to do it as if he’s moving forward and not trying to hurt Heard or anyone else.” .