Billionaire Len Blavatnik has been ordered to testify about a film he paid for

Len Blavatnik is being asked to give evidence in a legal fight over a film his company paid for.

Lawyers for the Australian actress Rebel Wilson filed a request on Sept. 14 asking a Los Angeles Superior Court judge to help them compel the billionaire to sit for a deposition. It forms part of her defence against a defamation lawsuit brought by the producers of The Deb, the film she wrote, directed, produced and starred in. Blavatnik financed it through AI Film, the production company he owns.

He is one of the wealthiest people in media. Blavatnik chairs Access Industries, holds a majority stake in Warner Music Group, which he bought for $3.3 billion in 2011 and floated in 2020, and was knighted in Britain in 2017.

Wilson, 46, is best known for the Pitch Perfect films. The Deb is her first as a director, and it has never been released.

The dispute began with an accusation about money. Wilson said in 2024 that three producers, Amanda Ghost, Gregor Cameron and Vince Holden, had misappropriated roughly A$900,000 from the film's budget, and separately alleged that Ghost had sexually harassed Charlotte MacInnes, the film's lead actress, causing her to suffer a breakdown.

The three sued her for defamation in California on July 12, 2024, arguing among other things that Wilson had sought credit for music work she did not do and was retaliating over the film's credits. She countersued that October, repeating the embezzlement and harassment claims and alleging she had been coerced into signing agreements under duress.

She also turned on the financier. Wilson posted publicly in July 2024 asking Blavatnik to stop funding and protecting the three producers, calling the defamation suit bogus. He declined to comment.

Her own case has since collapsed.

A Los Angeles judge narrowed her breach-of-contract and fraud claims sharply at the start of this year, striking broad allegations about Ghost's past conduct and leaving the action focused on the production company rather than on Ghost personally. The court then dismissed Wilson's claims outright, without giving her the chance to amend them.

What the case now examines is her own conduct. The court granted Ghost permission to depose a public relations employee and to subpoena documents relating to a series of anonymous websites that accused her of sex trafficking. Camille Vasquez, who acts for the producers and previously represented Johnny Depp, said the case would now focus on serious questions about the source of smear websites deploying racist, false and abusive content to target Ghost, and that those issues would be pursued zealously in discovery.

Forbes reported in March that leaked audio appeared to show Wilson's public relations team discussing a smear campaign against Ghost.

Wilson returned to Blavatnik that same month. In a series of Instagram posts on March 17 she said she had travelled to New York to ask for his support over her difficulties with the producers, and that she sincerely thought he would do something about it. She alleged instead that he was financing lawsuits against her in more than one country. A source disputed the count, putting the number of cases at three rather than four.

She has not published documents supporting the claim that Blavatnik is paying for any of them.

The film itself remains unreleased. AI Film initially refused to let The Deb screen at the Toronto International Film Festival and reversed only after Wilson posted about the standoff publicly. It premiered there and has not reached cinemas since.

AI Film told the Guardian in July 2025 that the proceedings were regrettable but essential to ensure the film's timely release, and that audiences would love it.

Wilson told 60 Minutes Australia that the situation was her worst nightmare and felt like people trying to sling mud at her.

None of the allegations on either side has been proven.