Amber Heard has said she "felt less than human" during her multimillion-dollar defamation case against ex-husband Johnny Depp - but stands by "every word" of her testimony.
The 36-year-old actress spoke to NBC Today journalist Savannah Guthrie in her first TV interview since losing the court battle. Heard said each day she attended court she would walk past "three, four, sometimes six city blocks lined with people holding signs saying ‘Burn the witch’ and ‘Death to Amber’".
She described "Captain Jack Sparrow fans" attending the hearing in support of the Hollywood star as "vocal and energised" as she took the stand, adding that the trial was “the most humiliating and horrible thing I have ever been through”.
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“I have never felt more removed from my own humanity. I felt less than human,” she told Guthrie, adding that she would stand by her testimony “to my dying day”. When the journalist pressed her about Depp’s claim in court that he never hit her, asking: “Is that a lie?”, Heard responded: “Yes, it is.”
When Guthrie suggested some members of the public were “frankly disgusted” by what had played out in court over the six weeks of testimony and evidence in Fairfax County, Virginia, Heard agreed, telling her: "I would not blame the average person for looking at this and how this has been covered and thinking that this is Hollywood brats at their worst."
But the actress claimed it was "actually so much bigger than that" and not "only about our First Amendment right to speak". Guthrie interjected, saying that the First Amendment "doesn’t protect lies that amount to defamation, and that was the issue in the case".
Heard also addressed comments made by Depp’s lawyer during closing arguments in which they called her evidence “the performance of a lifetime” and claimed she was acting while in the witness box. Referring to Depp’s 1990 performance as Edward Scissorhands, she responded: “Says the lawyer for the man who convinced the world he had scissors for fingers. I am a performer? I had listened to weeks of testimony insinuating – or saying quite directly – that I am a terrible actress. So I am bit confused how it can be both.”
Heard used the interview to address her own behaviour during the marriage, and when asked about evidence claiming she too had been violent during their relationship, Heard said: “I never had to instigate it. I responded to it. When you are living in violence it becomes normal. As I testified to, you have to adapt.”
However, she admitted that she "did do and say horrible, regrettable things" during the marriage. "I behaved in horrible, almost unrecognisable to myself ways. So much regret," she told the interviewer. “I have freely, openly and voluntarily talked about what I did. I talked about the horrible language, I talked about being pushed to the extent where I didn’t even know the difference between right and wrong."
She described her relationship with Depp as “very, very toxic”. “We were awful to each other," she said. "I made a lot of mistakes, a lot of mistakes. I have always told the truth.”
Two weeks ago, the jury found the 2018 article Heard wrote for the Washington Post about her experiences as a survivor of domestic abuse to be defamatory. Depp consistently denied during his own evidence the “outrageous, outlandish” claims of abuse and said he had “spoken up for what I have been carrying on my back reluctantly for six years”.
The 59-year-old was awarded 10.35 million US dollars in damages. Heard won on one count of her countersuit, successfully arguing that Depp’s press agent defamed her by claiming her allegations were “an abuse hoax” aimed at capitalising on the #MeToo movement. The jury awarded her two million dollars in damages.
Depp previously lost a similar trial in the UK which he brought against the publisher of The Sun newspaper after an article, also written in 2018, referred to him as a “wife-beater”.
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