Rebel Wilson claims producers are trying to “bury” her new movie
Rebel Wilson has recently made her directorial debut with The Deb, however, she claims that backers of the movie are preventing the film from premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival.
The Deb is an Australian comedy musical that is not only directed and co-written by Wilson, but she also has a starring role. She states that the film was initially chosen as the feature for the closing night of TIFF 2024 before it was withdrawn without her permission. Wilson said producers Amanda Ghost and Gregor Cameron and executive producer Vince Holden were involved in “embezzling funds” from the indie feature and allegedly attempted to “bury” it. Wilson states that the trio acted with “absolute viciousness” and with “retaliatory behaviour” by pulling the film from the festival.
Wilson took to social media to talk about the film’s controversy, saying, “So you might have noticed that I did a post like a week ago about my film. It’s the first film that I’ve directed that I’m so proud of, The Deb, which is a little Australian original musical that is so cute.”
She continued, “And it’s awesome that it got selected for closing night of the Toronto Film Festival, which is like the best platform to be a first-time female director. I mean, it’s huge. It’s massive.”
Wilson continued to talk about her devastation that the film is being stopped from premiering and how sad she is that it won’t be shown in Toronto. “This dates back to October of last year, where I discovered bad behaviour by these business partners,” he said, “I just tell it how it is. So I’m just going to tell you who they are, the so-called producers of the film.”
Wilson names the producers and the executive producer and details their behaviour. “It was not minor things but big things, you know, inappropriate behaviour towards the lead [actor] and embezzling funds from the film’s budget which we really needed because we’re a small movie. So kind of really important things.”
She continued, “Since I reported that behaviour, I have been met with absolute viciousness and retaliatory behaviour… Every step of the way, these people who I complained about then tried to make my life hell.”
Wilson finished by claiming that the producers could attempt to stop the final film from ever seeing the light of day. She alleges that the producers have a history of trying to do this and that people who work with them are usually forced to sign NDAs. The Australian said, “I’m not like that. I won’t be threatened. I will speak the truth and warn people about these people in the industry who are just not behaving ethically.”
In response to the allegations made by Wilson on social media, a spokesperson for Ghost, Cameron and Holden told Deadline: “RW’s allegations are false, defamatory, and disappointing. Her self-promotional claims are clearly intended to cause reputational harm to the individuals who have supported her directorial debut film The Deb — a joyous movie that we’re very proud of and are looking forward to sharing with audiences.”
The spokesperson concluded: “For her to promote a false narrative to advance her own agenda undermines the film and all the people who worked on this project.”