A lawyer for Eva Green on Thursday accused producers of a collapsed film of trying to damage the performers reputation by depicting her as a diva.
The French actress, who played Vesper Lynd in James Bond thriller Casino Royale, is suing producers for a $1 million fee she says she is owed for A Patriot.
Green, 42, was lined up to star in the sci-fi thriller alongside Charles Dance and Helen Hunt, and was also an executive producer on the project, which collapsed in late 2019.
Production company White Lantern Film is fighting the claim and is countersuing, saying Green made unreasonable demands and undermined the production. Hearings in the case opened Thursday at the High Court in London.
Greens lawyer, Edmund Cullen, said the movie had been a passion project for Green and she had bent over backwards to get this done.
He said Green loved the script and wanted the film to be made, but the financial plan was never going to work.
This case is designed to paint my client as a diva to win headlines and damage her reputation, the lawyer said.
Lawyers for the production company argue in written submissions that Green had expressed a lack of confidence and dissatisfaction in some of the production team and had grown increasingly reluctant to be involved in the project.
White Lanterns evidence includes expletive-filled text messages in which Green called one of the films executive producers, Jake Seal, evil a devious sociopath and a mad man, and branded production manager Terry Bird a moron.
Greens lawyer, Cullen, said the text message had to be seen in context as an informal venting of a stream of consciousness during a tense stage of the films production.
He accused the production company of seeking to lay every failure of the production at Ms. Greens door.
It seems to be designed to blacken the name of an actor who has not breached a contract or missed a days shooting in a career spanning 20 years, he said in written arguments.
Green is expected to testify later during the eight-day hearing.
Learn how to navigate and strengthen trust in your business with The Trust Factor, a weekly newsletter examining what leaders need to succeed. Sign up here.
