Rebel Wilson has been accused of defamation by an actress in The Deb, her directorial debut that has become embroiled in a messy legal saga.

An attorney representing Charlotte MacInnes — who plays a teenager attending a debutante ball in The Deb — has written to Wilson, arguing that the Australian star damaged her reputation in a series of Instagram posts between September 2024 and July 2025.

Among her social media claims, Wilson alleged that MacInnes changed her story about being sexually harassed by The Deb producer Amanda Ghost after she was cast in Boston stage show Gatsby and was offered a record deal.

Wilson also claimed that MacInnes lied by denying that she had made a complaint to Wilson about unwanted sexual advances made by Ghost during production.

In the “concerns notice,” the first stage of defamation proceedings in Australia, Giles George lawyer Patrick George wrote: “The publications carried seriously defamatory imputations damaging to Ms MacInnes’ personal and professional reputation.

“This was her first lead role in a film and you cruelled her professional reputation before she could even enjoy the benefit of the success of the film as the lead actress.”

MacInnes’ defamation claim adds to a growing pile of lawsuits around the musical movie, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September last year.

The Deb’s producers, Ghost, Gregory Cameron, and Vince Holden, filed a defamation suit against Wilson in the Los Angeles Superior Court, claiming she was “spreading vicious lies without regard for the irreparable damage her reckless words would cause.”

In a counter suit, lawyers for Wilson said that the Pitch Perfect star is “determined to fight not only for herself but also for The Deb and for all those who have silently suffered” from producer Ghost’s “reprehensible actions over the years.”

A third complaint was lodged in New South Wales last month by UK-based AI Film (part of Len Blavatnik’s Access Industries Group), a producer on The Deb. It accuses Wilson of deliberately sabotaging the film’s release.

Wilson responded on Instagram: “As the director, producer, and co-star who nurtured a project called The Deb for five years from a three-page idea into a gorgeous feature film, I want nothing more than to have this film released, and have been working tirelessly behind the scenes to get this to happen.”

Wilson’s agent has been contacted for comment.