Rebel Wilson gets emotional as she talks about $3.7m defamation case

Rebel Wilson broke down during an interview on an Australian TV show as she spoke about the lengthy defamation case against a global magazine publisher earlier this year. Although the Australian actor won the case, she revealed that the false accusations portraying her as a serial liar almost destroyed her career.

After Bauer Media was found to have defamed her in articles published in titles like Woman's Day and Australian Women's Weekly, Wilson was awarded $3.7m (£2.7m) in damages. This is the highest defamation payout in Australian history. According to the articles, Wilson had lied about her age, her name and her family upbringing.

"I went from this girl who has just worked her absolute arse off to get where she was to just being torn down in a second, in a 24-hour period. It's very, very stressful when you become in the centre of a scandal. And it was so salacious. People were like, 'She's fabricating her own life to make it'," the actor told Melissa Doyle, host of Australia's Channel 7 TV show Sunday Night.

The Pitch Perfect star denies lying about her age but had chosen not to make it public. She also revealed that 'Rebel' was a family nickname which she had legally adopted in 2002.

Wilson got emotional as she said: "Yes, I'm an actress and I'm in the public eye, but I'm a human being, who worked really, really hard to get to that point. And then to have it all taken away was just, it was just malicious, and it was ugly."

The actor also said that she decided to file a lawsuit against Bauer Media, when she stopped getting calls for work. "After month, after month, after month, coming up to the 12 months deadline, I thought, I mean, I just have to sue them."

Wilson has promised to donate the payout to charity and to support the Australian film industry. Soon after winning the case, she tweeted: "I'm looking forward to helping out some great Australian charities and supporting the Oz film industry with the damages I've received."

The actor has a list of projects lined up which includes her reprising the role of Fat Amy in Pitch Perfect 3, which is scheduled for release on 1 January 2018.

She will also be seen alongside Anne Hathaway in Nasty Women, a remake of 1988 comedy Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and a romantic comedy movie, Isn't It Romantic, with Liam Hemsworth and Priyanka Chopra.