Former Bond girl Eva Green to get $1m fee after winning case over collapsed film

Actress Eva Green has said her “professional reputation has been upheld” after she won her High Court case over payment for an abandoned film.

The 42-year-old, best known for appearing in James Bond movie Casino Royale, sued White Lantern Film for the million-dollar fee she was due to be paid by the makers of A Patriot.

The company and its lender countersued, saying she had renounced the contract by refusing to perform and making “excessive creative and financial demands”. Production on the film was halted in October 2019.

In WhatsApp messages revealed in the case, Green called one member of the film’s team a “f****** moron” who she thought should be fired and labelled another worker “evil”.

She also described some proposed crew members as “s***** peasants” and executive producer Jake Seal as “pure vomit”.

Green later apologised for “inappropriate language” and suggested her “Frenchness” was to blame.

She said one of the messages was an “emotional response” after being lied to about where the production would be shot.

Green said after her court win that the company had used her “as a scapegoat to cover up their own mistakes” and “made false allegations”.

“I am proud that I stood up against their bully-boy tactics,” she added.

‘Cruel and untrue’

Green said reporting of the case had “felt like being set upon by hounds” and that the ordeal had been “painful and damaging”.

She said: “I found myself misrepresented, quoted out of context and my desire to make the best possible film was made to look like female hysteria.

“It was cruel and it was untrue.”

The actress previously said having her messages disclosed was “humiliating” and denied she’d refused to perform.

“In the 20 years that I have been making films, I have never broken a contract or even missed one day of shooting,” she told the court in January.

In her victory statement, she said she’d “fought tooth and nail to defend the beautiful film that I loved and had signed on for”.

The judge decided Green had not renounced her contract nor committed any “repudiatory breaches” – meaning she’s set to get her $1m (£803,000) fee.

‘Sarcastic and denigrating’

Mr Justice Michael Green said there had been an “overinterpretation” of her messages – which stemmed from “a genuine feeling of concern that any film made under Mr Seal’s control would be of very low quality”.

He said the producer had been “patronising, sarcastic and denigrating” during evidence and he could see how others might dislike him.

“The reality is, however, that neither side was prepared to make the film that the other wanted to make,” the judge said.

“Ms Green made it clear that she did not want to make the film under Mr Seal’s full control; and the defendants were only interested in recovering SMC’s loan.”

He also criticised Green, calling her “surprisingly under-prepared for her evidence” and “in some senses a frustrating and unsatisfactory witness”.

The judge wrote: “She said it was ‘humiliating’ but some of her explanations for the language she used and the feelings she expressed – such as they were down to her ‘Frenchness’ – were not credible or adequate.”