Staying true to her name, Australian actress Rebel Wilson doesn’t believe in mincing words. She proved this recently by calling out her The Brothers Grimsby co-star Sacha Baron Cohen for allegedly harassing her to the extent that the ghosts of her past continue to haunt her to date. So much so that she dedicated an entire chapter of her forthcoming memoir Rebel Rising to him.
An excerpt from the upcoming book alleges that Cohen (SBC) pressured Wilson into going nude while on set for the 2016 film. While SBC denies it, Wilson called him out in a series of Instagram stories much before her memoir’s official release.
If this piece of news has got you invested in discovering if SBC really was the “massive a**hole” who gave the Senior Year actor hell, we have got you covered.
Here’s unravelling the controversy brewing between Rebel Wilson and Sacha Baron Cohen.
All about the Sacha Baron Cohen-Rebel Wilson controversy
It all started on 15 March 2024, when Rebel Wilson posted a video on Instagram promoting her upcoming memoir, Rebel Rising. She spoke about a particular actor who made her life miserable on a movie set and divulged details about the chapter that talks about the challenging phase.
She said, “When I first came to Hollywood, people were like, ‘Yeah I have a no-a**hole policy, means I don’t work with a**holes. It really sunk in what they were meaning by that, older people in the industry, because I worked with a massive a**hole. Now I definitely have a no-a**holes policy. The chapter on said a**hole is chapter 23.”
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How do we know Wilson is talking about Sacha Baron Cohen?
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While this cryptic video raised eyebrows, fans didn’t have to wait long to get their hands on their copy to learn about the details. Wilson, who is known for holding her ground, unravelled more details about her self-reported blind item 10 days later, further fuelling the Sacha Baron Cohen controversy.
“I will not be bullied or silenced with high-priced lawyer or PR crisis managers. The ‘a**hole’ that I am talking about in ONE CHAPTER of my book is Sacha Baron Cohen,” Wilson wrote in an Instagram story on March 24, leaving no room for speculations and setting the record straight.
In the now-disappeared Instagram story, Wilson also revealed that her co-star was trying to threaten and silence her. “Now the a**hole is trying to threaten me. He’s hired a crisis PR manager and lawyers. He’s trying to stop the press coming out about my new book. But the book WILL come out and you will all know the truth,” she wrote.
What exactly did Rebel Wilson say about Sacha Baron Cohen?
Wilson rewinds the reel to 2016 when she was shooting for a supporting role in SBC’s movie The Brothers Grimsby. During an appearance on an Australian radio show in 2014, the actor described Cohen’s alleged on-set harassment.
“Every day, he’s like, ‘Just go naked, it will be funny. Remember in Borat when I did that naked scene? It was hilarious,’” Wilson said, adding, “On the last day, I thought I’d obviously won the argument, and he got a body double to do the naked scene.”
Wilson further went on to highlight that Baron Cohen reached a new level of low on the last day of the shoot. “He was like, ‘Rebel, can you just stick your finger up my butt?’ And I went, ‘What do you mean, Sacha? That’s not in the script,’” She said, adding, “And he’s like, ‘Look, I’ll just pull down my pants, you just stick your finger, it’ll be a really funny bit.’”
Back in 2017, Wilson had shared a similar story in a series of now-deleted tweets and had spoken about a male actor in a position of power asking her to go into a room with him and repeatedly coaxing her to perform the act.
What does Sacha Baron Cohen have to say about the controversy?
On 25 March, Cohen outrightly denied Wilson’s account of the day in question and dubbed the claims as ‘demonstrably false’. He provided People and US Weekly with anonymous statements from those involved with the movie disputing her claims.
“While we appreciate the importance of speaking out, these demonstrably false claims are directly contradicted by extensive detailed evidence, including contemporaneous documents, film footage and eyewitness accounts from those present before, during and after the production of The Brothers Grimsby,” a statement from Cohen’s team said in response to Wilson’s allegations.
If Rebel Wilson is being this outspoken on Instagram stories, one can only imagine how candidly she’ll talk in her upcoming book, which comes out on 2 April.
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(Header and feature image courtesy: Instagram/Rebel Wilson/Sacha Baron Cohen)
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
– Have Rebel Wilson and Sacha Baron Cohen collaborated in the past?
Wilson and Baron Cohen worked together on the 2016 R-rated film The Brothers Grimsby. In the comedy, Wilson plays the girlfriend of Cohen’s character Nobby, an English football hooligan who becomes an elite spy.
