Inside the bombshell lawsuit against Matt Damon, Ben Affleck — and why Hollywood is watching closely
Two Miami cops’ explosive lawsuit against Matt Damon and Ben Affleck may be DOA in court, legal experts tell Page Six Hollywood.
The bombshell suit made headlines yesterday in every major outlet. But speaking to legal experts, it’s unclear if the case has much firepower beyond the headlines.
Either way, the industry is watching the case closely as it could have ripple effects: “The Rip” is just the latest film to trigger a lawsuit, and not all of them have fizzled.
A number of other Netflix projects, including “The Queen’s Gambit,” “Inventing Anna” and “Baby Reindeer,” have all become targets of defamation suits brought by real life figures who say they are depicted in the scripts.
“The Rip” is inspired by a real-life drug bust in 2016. ©Netflix/Courtesy Everett Collection
FX’s smash hit “Love Story,” which centers on the romance between JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, has become embroiled in its own simmering real life drama about the show’s portrayal of actress Daryl Hannah, who has publicly bashed the Ryan Murphy-produced series.
Damon, Affleck and their production company were sued over “The Rip,” a fictionalized account, inspired by a real-life drug bust in 2016, where $24 million in cash was recovered from a private residence in Miami Lakes. A central conceit in “The Rip” is that writer-director Joe Carnahan subjects viewers to a constant bait-and-switch, employing notions of shifting suspicion and allegiances throughout the story.
But the pair of real-life cops, who are sergeants in the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office, are challenging how far that artistic license can go.
Eric George, a California-based attorney who specializes in first amendment and defamation cases, calls “The Rip” lawsuit “ridiculous” — and he predicts it will be dismissed, based on the movie’s disclaimer that it was dramatized and the creators’ decision not to use real names of those involved.
But George also addressed the mounting pile of cases stemming from various shows and films that are “based” on actual events.
“If you changed the person’s name and made clear that this story is dramatized, you are on much stronger legal footing,” George said. “It’s not necessarily a silver bullet, but that’s going to take you a long way there.”
The duo’s production company is also embroiled in the defamation suit. ©Netflix/Courtesy Everett Collection
When you don’t change the person’s name? It’s a bit more complicated. The late Olivia de Havilland tried and failed to sue FX over her portrayal in the second season of “Feud,” another Murphy-produced series.
And then there is the case of former Vanity Fair editor Rachel DeLoache Williams who sued Netflix for defamation over her portrayal in the Shonda Rhimes series “Inventing Anna,” about real-life con woman Anna Sorokin. Williams argued that she was made out to be the villain in an effort to make the fictional Sorokin (Julia Garner) more sympathetic. A few years earlier, Nona Gaprindashvili, a Georgian chess player, sued Netflix for $5 million claiming “The Queen’s Gambit” falsely said she had “never faced men.” In both of those instances, Netflix settled.
According to George, disclaimers matter.
“The Queen’s Gambit” featured a standard disclaimer, stating that “the characters and events depicted in this program are fictitious. No depiction of actual persons or events is intended,” while “Baby Reindeer” opens with the claim, “This is a true story,” but includes a post-credits disclaimer stating it is a dramatization that fictionalizes certain events for dramatic purpose. “Inventing Anna,” meanwhile, has this quirky disclaimer: “This whole story is completely true. Except for all the parts that are totally made up.
But with Hollywood’s current love of journalistic source material, we can expect more of this.
In March, Daryl Hannah penned an op-ed in the New York Times that strongly criticized her portrayal in “Love Story.” In that hit, Hannah is depicted in a villainous role and, per the real-life Hannah, is shown doing things she didn’t do, including illegal activities. “The actions and behaviors attributed to me are untrue. I have never used cocaine in my life or hosted cocaine-fueled parties,” she wrote. “Many people believe what they see on TV and do not distinguish between dramatization and documented fact — and the impact is not abstract.”are being depicted and reputations being harmed.”
