Skip to footer

Evan Rachel Wood sued for $30 million. Why?

Evan Rachel Wood was sued by producers of '10 Things I Hate about Life' for breach of contract. But a rep for Evan Rachel Wood has a different version of events.

Evan Rachel Wood didn't show up for work.

That's the claim being made by producers of the now unmade movie, "10 Things I Hate About Life."  So, they're suing the actress for $30 million in a breach of contract lawsuit.

In a lawsuit filled in the Los Angeles Superior Court, the producers claim that Evan Rachel Wood was paid an initial $300,000 to star in the film. But "seemingly changed her mind about appearing in the film during principle photography, ultimately refusing without any legal justification to fulfill her contractual obligations and instead opting to walk out on the project," the lawsuit claims.

But the Hollywood Reporter says that a lawyer for Wood offered a different version of events.

 "The lawsuit is preposterous and simply a bullying tactic from financially troubled producers. The production shut down in February 2013, when the producers ran out of money.

"Even after that, Evan agreed to resume production in Nov. 2013, by which time the producers said they would have cleared up their issues. However, the producers still could not get their act together, nor did they pay Evan money that was owed," the statement goes on to claim.

The film was to be a sequel to the 1999 romantic comedy, "10 Things I Hate About You," which was a modern take on Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew. That successful film boosted the careers of Julia Stiles, Heath Ledger, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

Evan Rachel Wood won several awards for her performance in the film Thirteen in 2003. She was nominated for a 2012 Golden Globe and an Emmy for her performance in Mildred Pierce (2011).

While such lawsuits are relatively rare, Wood is not the first actress to be sued for an alleged breach of contract.

Last year, True Crime LLC sued an actress for refusing to appear in sex scenes, according to the Hollywood Reporter. The suit alleged that she broke the terms of the nudity rider "by, among other things, refusing (a) 'to appear and perform in nude scenes and/or simulated lovemaking scenes' ... 'as may be determined by the Producer' and (b) to 'appear and perform nude in the Program as required by Producer.' "

But actors have also gone after producers. Last year, Daniel Curry sued the producers, engineers, and theater owners involved in the Broadway musical “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” He filed a lawsuit claiming negligence after his foot was injured during a performance that used a mechanical lift to simulate him flying across the set.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Evan Rachel Wood sued for $30 million. Why?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Movies/2014/0607/Evan-Rachel-Wood-sued-for-30-million.-Why
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe