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In the wake of Johnny Depp’s bitter divorce from Amber Heard and his subsequent lawsuits involving his ex, fans of the “Pirates of the Caribbean” star took to social media calling for Warner Bros. to ditch Heard from her role as Mera in the sequel to “Aquaman”.
Meanwhile, an online petition calling for her removal from the movie gained more than 1.8 million signatures.
However, “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” producer Peter Safran says that online pressure campaigns and petitions had no influence on casting decisions for the movie.
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“I don’t think we’re ever going to react to, honestly, pure fan pressure,” said Safran in an interview with the “Deadline Hero Nation” podcast, reported Deadline.
“You gotta do what’s best for the movie,” continued Safran. “We felt that if it’s [director] James Wan and [star] Jason Momoa, it should be Amber Heard. That’s really what it was.”
According to Safran, these type of pressure campaigns don’t necessarily have the kind of clout fans might think they do.
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“One is not unaware of what is going on in the Twitter-verse, but that doesn’t mean you have to react to it or take it as gospel or accede to their wishes,” said Safran, “You have to do what’s right for the film, and that’s really where we landed on it.”
The interview can be heard in its entirety below: