Johnny Depp says he believed Amber Heard was having affair with James Franco

One of the most shocking points in Depp’s testimony came Wednesday when he described seeing a photo of faeces on his bed days after a fight with Heard.

The actor that he didn’t see Heard between 22 April and 21 May 2016 as he had “received some news that was as absurd and grotesque and cruel, and then I was shown a picture of what the problem was”.

When Heard was out of town, Depp wanted to visit the penthouse where she was staying to collect items that were important to him, but his security guard said it wasn’t a good time.

He said he was shown a photo of “our bed and on my side of the bed was human faecal matter, so I understood why it wasn’t a good time to go down there”.

Mr Depp said his “initial response” was to “laugh”.

“It was so outside, it was so bizarre and so grotesque that I could only laugh,” he added.

The Independent’s Gustaf Kilander reports:

Depp on Wednesday likened his marriage to Heard to his fraught relationship with his mother, calling it an “endless parade of insults”.

He recalled how “demeaning name calling”, being “berated” and “made a fool of” by Ms Heard would frequently escalate into full scale arguments.

“If there’s a dialogue between two people, both people need to speak. But there was no way to fit a word in. It was a sort of rapid-fire, endless parade of insults,” he said, adding that he “was not allowed to be right and not allowed to have a voice”.

“You start to slowly realise that you are in a relationship with your mother, in a sense. And I know that sounds perverse and obtuse, but the fact is, some people search for weaknesses in people,” he said.

The Independent’s Megan Sheets reports:

Depp opened his testimony on Tuesday afternoon in Fairfax County, Virginia, by calling his ex-wife’s claims “heinous,” “disturbing” and “not based in any species of truth”.

The Hollywood veteran invoked Disney characters in explaining how the allegations have affected his career, saying: “[It’s] very strange when one day you’re Cinderella so to speak and then in 0.6 seconds you’re Quasimodo.”

The Independent’s Megan Sheets reports:

The Independent team recaps the most unmissable moments in court so far:

As Depp was cross-examined about the vodka bottle fight on Thursday, the jury was shown images of the messages and he scrawled on mirrors and furniture in blood and paint after his finger was severed.

Depp testified that he suffered a “nervous breakdown” after the injury, which caused him to “write in my own blood on the walls”.

He described the messages as “little reminders from our past that essentially represented lies that she had told me and lies that I had caught her in,” adding that he hid in a bathroom and texted his doctor to come over.

He said when the wound dried, he dipped his fingers in paint to continue writing.

One of the most gripping points in Depp’s testimony this week came as he described how his finger was severed during a fight with Heard in Australia in 2015.

Under questioning from his own lawyers, he told how he tried to remove himself from the spiraling confrontation.

“It was all getting too crazy,” Depp told the court under questioning from his own lawyers. “I was a mess, I was a wreck, I was shaking.”

He recalled pouring himself two or three “stiff shots of vodka”, before Heard yelled: “Oh, you’re drinking again.”

Depp said Heard then hurled two vodka bottles at him, cutting off the tip of his finger.

The Independent’s Gustaf Kilander describes the unsettling retelling:

During Thursday’s cross-examination, the court learned that Depp called his ex Vanessa Paradis, the mother of his children, a “French extortionist c***” in an email to British singer Elton John.

Depp, 58, said Heard, 36, told him that his two children, Lily-Rose Depp, 22, and John Christopher Depp III, 20, didn’t like him and that he was a “bad father”. Depp said that in reality, his children didn’t like Ms Heard.

Ms Heard’s legal team pushed back against the claim by sharing a 2013 email from Mr Depp to Sir Elton, in which Mr Depp shared his displeasure with Ms Paradis, 49 – his partner from 1998 until 2012.

The Independent’s Gustaf Kilander reports:

The third week of the defamation trial opposing Depp and Heard will resume on Monday with the former taking the witness stand for more cross-examination.

While it’s unclear who will be up to testify after Depp, here’s a look at the possibilities:

The explosive defamation trial between Depp and Heard is unfolding well outside their normal Hollywood orbit – at a court in Fairfax County, Virginia.

Depp’s suit against his ex-wife alleges that she defamed him in a December 2018 op-ed published in The Washington Post titled “I spoke up against sexual violence — and faced our culture’s wrath. That has to change”.

The trial is taking place in Fairfax because the online edition of The Post is published via servers in the county, allowing Depp to sue her in that area.

According to the Associated Press, Heard’s attorneys tried to get the trial moved to California but Depp’s lawyers said one of the reasons they decided to sue in Virginia was because of the state’s anti-SLAPP legislation, which is not as wide-ranging as in California.

The Independent’s Gustaf Kilander explains:

Johnny Depp and Amber Heard are believed to have started dating that year, after Depp split from his longtime partner, French actor Vanessa Paradis. Depp and Paradis have two children: a daughter named Lily-Rose and a son named Jack.

The couple confirmed their engagement in March 2014 and tied the knot in February 2015.

By May 2016, Heard was filing for divorce.

Here’s everything you need to know about their doomed relationship: