‘Grubby stories cut me to the core’

RAGS-TO-RICHES Hollywood star Rebel Wilson’s “world collapsed” when a series of magazine articles painted her as a fake and a liar, a Melbourne court has heard.

The Supreme Court of Victoria yesterday heard Wilson (above) was “cut to the core” when she discovered 1.5 million people had read an online article claiming she’d lied about her age, name and childhood.

Wilson is suing Bauer Media, publisher of Woman’s Day, for defamation over a campaign of eight articles published in three days during 2015.

Her lawyer Matthew Collins QC, in his opening address to an all-female jury, said the articles were timed to coincide with the pinnacle of Wilson’s career, during the release of Pitch Perfect 2, in which Wilson had a starring role.

Wilson has flown in to Melbourne from America for the three-week trial, and was present in court yesterday accompanied by her sister Anna, 25. Mr Collins told the jury about Wilson’s working-class Sydney childhood and the hardships she’d faced in making it in Hollywood, years after she’d had a dream about winning an Oscar while ill with malaria.

He said those dreams were shattered when Bauer Media published “grubby articles” that defamed her.

“She thought she’d never been hit with such nastiness, coincided to time with the pinnacle of her career,” he said.

The court heard the Fat Pizza star was subsequently fired from a number of movie roles.