Amber Heard sets first post-trial interview, says she doesn’t “blame” jurors for verdict
Heard's conversation with Savannah Guthrie will air on both TODAY and Dateline this week
Aux News Amber Heard
Amber Heard has completed her first public interview since a jury ruled in Johnny Depp’s favor in his defamation suit against her. Heard will sit down with NBC News’ Savannah Guthrie to discuss the verdict, the trial, and the inescapable influence social media had on the process in a conversation set to air on TODAY and on a special episode of Dateline.
“Even somebody who is sure I am deserving of all this hate and vitriol, even if you think that I’m lying you still couldn’t look me in the eye and tell me that you think on social media there’s been a fair representation,” Heard says in a preview of the interview, which aired on TODAY Monday morning. “ You cannot tell me that you think that this has been fair.”
When Guthrie finally brings up the trial’s verdict—and that the jury rejected Heard’s testimony to rule in Depp’s favor—Heard makes it clear she doesn’t fault them for how Depp’s team was able to sway their viewpoints.
“How could [the jury] not come to that conclusion?” Heard says. “They had sat in those seats and heard over three weeks of nonstop relentless testimony from paid employees and, towards the end of the trial, randos, as I say.”
She continues: “I don’t blame them, I actually understand. [Depp]’s a beloved character, and people feel they know him. He’s a fantastic actor.”
Depp accused Heard of defamation after she referred to herself as a “public figure representing domestic abuse” in a 2018 Washington Post op-ed. The trial gained a fervent online following (the worst of it on TikTok) that saw celebrities like Lance Bass imitating Heard’s tearful testimony about the alleged abuse, and Depp fans heading down to the courthouse to wave concert-style posters outside. Though the trial, undoubtedly left huge marks on both of their reputations, Depp is already moving forward with a new album and docuseries on the way.
Additional portions of Heard’s interview will be shown on Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s episodes of TODAY, before the hour-long conversation airs on Dateline Friday night at 8 P.M E.T.
63 Comments
Nevermind
That’s nice of her.
I thought so, too. I think people who openly threaten to lie to the police about a partner’s abuse, and who also drop steamers on former lovers’ night tables, are misunderstood.
Brenda Krouse: Hello. I’m Brenda Krouse, “On Broadway”. Now, that music, and these posters, are, of course, from the Rogers & Hammerstein classic “The King & I”. Now, tonight we’ll be getting to know the man who’s now starring in the Westbury Music Fair production – Ross Treadway. Ross, welcome.Ross Treadway: Thank you.Brenda Krouse: Now, you took over the lead role in the show, the King of Siam, from the legendary Yul Brynner, who virtually made a career out of the role. I mean, he won countless awards, broke all kinds of box office records. I think it must be tremendously frustrating to step into the shadow of a performer like that, am I right? It must be a no-win situation.Ross Treadway: So, what are you saying, that the show should be abandoned, never perform it again?Brenda Krouse: Oh, no, not at all..Ross Treadway: [ angry ] Then, what’s your point?Brenda Krouse: Well, I-I-I.. just mean that, you know, you’ve got some pretty big shoes to fill. I mean, Yul Brynner was so popular in that role.Ross Treadway: [ guffaws ] Oh, really? He was? What an interesting news item, I’d better write that down – Yul Brynner, popular, “King & I”.
Brenda Krouse: [ stunned by Ross’ outburst ] Uh.. I guess I can understand how it would be a, uh.. a sore point.Ross Treadway: Alright, listen, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying Yul Brynner wasn’t good in the role, I’m sure he was. All I’m saying is that there’s a guy by the name of Ross Treadway, and he’s pretty good, too.Brenda Krouse: Okay. Alright. Well, the reviews, overall, have been pretty favorable. Looking at my notes here, I see that your performance has been called “satisfactory”, “adequate”, “serviceable”..Ross Treadway: [ annoyed ] Yeah. You know, my favorite was “workmanlike”. A response like that doesn’t exactly blast you out of bed in the morning!Brenda Krouse: But, you know, Ross, you really can’t blame people for making that comparison, can you?Ross Treadway: Who can’t blame people? I can blame. You bet I can blame!
Translation: I don’t blame the jury for being gullible and stupid.Anyone who doubted she shit in the bed doubts no longer.
Talk about gullible if you’re dumb enough to believe Johnny Depp
If you take either side in this cacophony of a mud-slinging debacle, you’re beyond gullible. You’re willfully obtuse.
Nah I think I’ll take the side of the woman who was being abused for years
…which is what I implied, yes. Obviously.
Actually, you said “If you take either side in this cacophony of a mud-slinging debacle, you’re beyond gullible. You’re willfully obtuse.” Which very clearly does not mean “take the side of the abuse victim.” Like, what?
You’re so close, recog. So close.
I love it when you guys try to tell me not to believe my own eyes
My eyes saw the photoshopped images in the court room so like….lol Do you get paid to troll like this? Who is it, you can tell us. Russia?
And you have proof they were photoshopped right
Just the evidence they provided in court showing they were 🤡
Which is?
Talk about gullible if you can watch Amber on that stand and still believe her. Or listen to her on that tape and not think that she’s an abuser.
The tape where she said she was terrified that Depp was going to kill her?
You weren’t paying attention
The fact that so many people are willing to defend him is hilarious. Even Amber Heard in that quote refers to him as a character and that people “feel they know him”. Wake up, you don’t know Johnny Depp. He’s not your childhood friend or school yard crush. The era of people wanting to feel like they know celebrities is fucking ridiculous. These people who “want to hang out with Chris Pratt” for a day or whatever need to grow up. Celebrities cultivate what parts of their public persona are available to you the consumer which has resulted in stuff like RDJ being required to emboddy Tony Stark offscreen for the past decade.
Point being, I prefer the way Tom Cruise does it where he doesn’t really let fans know about his personal life – to me that’s way more authentic then gloming to fake public personas. People say “separate the art from the artist” but now that I know things like Johnny Depp ripping all of Amber Heards clothes off performing a cavity search on her hunting for cocaine, I can safely say I now know too much information about Johnny Depp to separate the art from the artist.
whatever you believe substantively, the trial on a procedural level was a joke and the fact that the jury were going home to watch tiktok videos is actually insane. It was never a fair trial.And anyone shitting on her for doing an interview, the gal has legal fees to pay. (Also people like to ignore that Head paid half of the money she pledged which was to be paid in instalments, which is very normal for legal contracts of that sort, and then she stopped getting work and had to pay for lawyers for all this defamation shit).
they didn’t sequester the fuckin’ jury in a media frenzy trial like this????
nope, and they were aware of some jury prejudice around some really regressive views of domestic abuse. A real clown fest that more than anything showed what a joke the jury system is.
Because a bunch of middle aged jurors went home after a long day of listening to the testimony to go immediately to tiktok and see everything that they just saw re-enacted by teenagers.That’s SOOOOOOO believable.
Do you think this media frenzy was only covered on Tik Tok?
I’m a middle-aged person who had no interest in this trial and did nothing to seek it out and it was still inescapable.
I don’t even know the number of times I hid and dismissed stupid shit about it on social media, and it still popped up.
So you believe her lawyer’s lies and ignored everything else about the trial. Good for you. Now all of the abuse survivors in your life will know that they can’t trust you.
You don’t typically sequester and isolate juries for a civil trial which is what this case was and where you and so many others are mistaken as its one of the major reasons why she lost.
you typically would in a media frenzy one like this where obviously the juries wouldn’t be able to remain unbiased. Also I think most people who think Heard was given an unfair trial know it was a civil defamation case. Depp had the trial in Virginia because he knew he had a better shot at turning this into a media frenzy, it shouldn’t have been televised as a civil trial either yet it was.
That’s still not how civil trials and juries work. Civil trials are not the same as criminal trials. There’s not barring of the press or having an unbiased jury.That’s the mistake Amber made. She should’ve pressed formal charges against him which would’ve made it a criminal trial, and that’s when you sequester juries, restrict the media, etc.
That’s true in Virginia, they don’t have the same shield laws in civil cases as they do in California. They live in California, Depp moving this to Virginia was so it could be filmed so he could publicly drag her. It’s so deliberate.And listen, it wasn’t Heard’s “mistake” she didn’t file reports of her abuse. I don’t know how people aren’t aware of how victim blamey they sound when they blame people for not acting “appropriately” after a trauma.
Yup, predictably in good AVClub commenter fashion, its all about the ideology and identity politics above and over how reality works.Listen, you do understand and know that you can file a civil claim and press criminal charges at the same time right? People do that all the time and civil and criminal cases happen together all the time. And saying again, with a criminal, you would’ve gotten all you wanted as the sequestered jury, media ban, and a criminal investigation against Depp. And given all of the evidence against Depp that exist, its highly likely he would’ve faced some jail time too.
Secondly, California’s shield laws don’t apply here. You mean the SLAPPs law, but that wasn’t the main reason why he moved the case to Virginia. The case was in Virginia because of the WaPo being based in Virginia.
But go on with the stupid, knee-jerk “everyone who disagrees with me victim blamer/shamer/Amber hater” to deflect and dodge away from the fact that you don’t seem to understand how the law, especially civil cases, work.
what are you talking about? you’re assuming Heard wanted to press criminal charges? Most victims don’t want to go to court because they don’t have evidence, or medical reports, and it’ll turn into a he said/she said trial and then basically you’re even more traumatized with no result. I’m sorry you don’t understand how most people work.The Post was not a defendant in the case, and the case could have easily been held in California. He just lucked out that the Post is in Virginia and knew he had a better chance of bringing this to a jury/having it televised to drag her some more.This shouldn’t even be a polarizing topic, she got an unfair trial.
What i’m talking about is not what you’re reading, because you’re just ranting and raving nonsense about “victims” and constantly showing off your ignorance of the system and this case and deflecting away any attempts to correcting you because you want to paint Amber as some kind of innocent angel.
Amber has some evidence of Depp abusing her. And if she had filed criminal charges, then the authorities would use their immense powers and resources to deeply investigate and ultimately subpoena Depp. And saying yet again, and again, a criminal trial would’ve meant the things you wanted and complaining about in your OP: sequestered jury, no media in the courtroom, criminal prosecution, trial in California, etc, etc.
Secondly, Depp didn’t “luck out” of anything. She did that op-ed on The Post. The Post is based in Virginia. If she had done that op-ed in the LA Times, then Depp would have no recourse to have the case in Virginia.
The point here that you’re missing here is that abuse/violence survivors should always ALWAYS press charges. No matter what. In almost all states there is either an absolute or a qualified privilege to make reports of a crime to police.
Where the privilege is absolute you can’t be sued even if you make a
false report of criminal activity to police. Where it is qualified you
can’t be sued so long as you have made a report in good faith and
without malice.
I’m a victim and I met with a lawyer many years after the abuse because that’s what I thought I needed for my healing. I had to fill out a simple questionnaire and I had such horrible flashbacks that I had a terrible drug relapse. My experience is very similar to lots of victims, where the last fucking thing on our mind is wanting to press charges. I don’t think you grasp how horrible it is to have your experience questioned, and how getting the authorities involved is really scary for most victims. Assuming that all victims want to press charges is seriously misguided. A lot of us just want peace, on our own terms, not some “justice” from the system.
Your condescending, mocking, and trolly tone is making it really hard believe that. Especially since you don’t seem to understand anything about how the law actually works as your attorney should’ve told you. And even if you are telling the truth, it really doesn’t change the point i’m making here which is abuse/violence victims should always come forward to press charges for the reasons I mentioned.
nice. and it was an initial intake, I think you kind of prove the point why nobody wants to come forward with abuse.
That you make things up on the internet to win arguments? Sure.
I saw and noticed your stealth edits and taking that “lol” and some of your mocking elements out. Nice try.
You just proved everyone’s point about how you some of you commentors here have some major emotional and mental problems.
“I saw and noticed your stealth edits and taking that “lol” and some of your mocking elements out. Nice try.”This is some choice projecting. The only stealth I see is your weird, stalkish behavior.
“ Most victims don’t want to go to court because they don’t have evidence,”What are you talking about? Amber Heard had mountains of…photoshopped….oh
Even with criminal trials jury sequestration is rare. It is not at all a common practice.
The trial was in Virginia because that’s where the Washington Post is physically printed in Fairfax county.
the post wasn’t the defendant, it didn’t actually have to be there.
I’ve seen his cologne ads are back on TV.I can’t imagine people really wanting to smell like Johnny Depp.He may be a great actor, but he looks like a bag lady when he’s not acting.
Those Dior ads were running DURING THE TRIAL. I was baffled.
Depp has the Asian Shooter haircut in those ads
Yeah I’m pretty sure he’s in the Famous Millionaire Sex Symbols Who Smell club along with Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis and whoever. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, I think?
Holy crap, reading the comments on that youtube video is crazy, people really do want to hate her. They say that nobody believes her, and the people who say otherwise (or just that they think both are toxic people) have a weirdly low amount of likes, just positive comments about JD have hundreds of likes. This is really bad, humanity wise. Even comments like “I don’t know how he could even put up with her, I would have hit her even more” get more likes, and they are in the same threads and conversations of people saying that she lied the whole time, and that JD never did anything. The amount of contradicotry statements and general level of self-imposed ignorance, just to hate this human being, is baffling and really scary.
Thats because sine of us are abuse survivors and amber reminds us of our abusers. .but hey tmyoi can pretend that it’s all misogynist if that makes you feel good. Just don’t be surprised when your friends who survived abuse stop talking to you vecayse they can’t trust you.
It is indeed pretty gross. A lot of people suck. I don’t think anyone really has the moral high ground in this mess, but man do the people who are wishing death, advocating for abuse, or whatever have the low, low, low ground.
Yeah I totally agree. This trial has just been such a rallying cry for sexist behaviour. What’s so sad is that I even see women participating it (who presumably had crushes on Johnny Depp during his pirate years). It makes me think of stuff like one time I saw a girl on tinder with the bio “I’m pretty funny for a girl” and I realized that some women actually believe that somehow women are less funny than men. Of course the reason for this being much fewer comedic roles being written for women etc. etc. etc. stand up was a boys club etc.
People getting this enraged at Amber Heard makes me think of one time an older male relative mentioned the TV show Mad Men to me and they admitted they they are jealous of Don Drape because “he’s so handsome that women feel obligated to forgive him”.
The Depp/Heard trial ruling makes me think of that quote “he’s so handsome that women feel obligated to forgive him” and it sends absolute fucking shivers down my spine and reminds me how deeply far away we are from gender equality.
It’s baffling to me that people have such fond nostalgia for Johnny Depp that Amber Heard is somehow public enemy number 1 and wishing harm upon her is considered cool… wtf world is this anymore.
I absolutely hate the symbolic nature of everything Depp winning represents. Is it a mere coincidence that a week after Depp won, Weinstein repealed in court as well as Louis CK promoting a new film he made? Come the fuck on the floodgates have been opened with this victory.
Yeap, it’s all pretty disheartening.
I mean, I get people can have different opinions, but to have so much vitriol for a person who simply stated that she was abused is crazy. I’m sorry guys, but he has always been an asshole and was arrested in the past for violent behaviors. Having him win now only makes it so that powerful and famous men who abuse people will never be punished for the bad stuff they do. This is just awful.
I actually love Mad Men and Don’s character is the one I enjoyed the least in rewatching the show, and I never ever would forgive him for his shitty behaviors… It’s crazy that some people would. I honestly did not think he deserved redemption at the end (as I think was implied).
Her lack of self-awareness is to blame. She’s going to be on the character rehabilitation tour for quite some time. Buckle up!
I believe Heard’s claims, but her interview style is just bad enough that she sounds unconvincing. Her affect is so dramatic and overstated that it looks like she’s….. acting. And it’s terrible acting.
No such thing as a perfect victim
“’randos’” as I say” might be the cringiest thing I’ve ever read.
Its probably been said before, but they’re probably just both awful people. Just Johnny is a leagues better actor than her.Source: I am an awful person
Yeah, I mean, if there’s one thing everyone SHOULD be able to agree on is that they’re both pretty messed up people. Of course, there’s a lot of crazy fanboys or fangirls who won’t even concede that point and act like one of them is an absolute saint who’s never sinned once. But man. A mess.
No social commentary, however, will change the ontological reality that Amber abused Johnny and falsely accused him.
So any predictions on how long it will take Ryan Murphy to adapt this into a miniseries for FX?
…And Savannah Guthrie’s husband works as a PR consultant for Johnny Depp’s legal team.