‘Serious harm': Ex-producer's claim against Seven
Former Spotlight producer Taylor Auerbach, who gave bombshell evidence during Bruce Lehrmann's defamation trial against Network 10 and Lisa Wilkinson, has taken the next step in his legal action against the Seven Network.
Mr Auerbach, who was a senior producer for the Spotlight series for two years from August 2021, filed defamation proceedings in the Federal Court in March 2025.
He is suing Seven over comments the network allegedly made about him after he gave evidence in Lehrmann's defamation trial. The concerns notice previously obtained by news.com.au names Seven chief executive James Warburton, former Seven commercial director Bruce McWilliam and producer and blogger Robert McKnight.
Mr Auerbach helped convince Lehrmann to be interviewed for the Spotlight program, which aired in June 2023, after the criminal case for the alleged rape of former colleague and political staffer Brittany Higgins was dropped out of fear for Ms Higgins' health.
Fronting the Federal Court of Victoria via livestream on Friday, Mr Auerbach was represented by barrister Sue Chrysanthou SC, who argued there was 'pretty good evidence of serious harm to (Mr Auerbach's) reputation' by Seven.
Ms Chrysanthou said Mr Auerbach was the 'primary employee engaged with Mr Lehrmann' and there was a 'lengthy chronology' that explained the interactions between Mr Auerbach and Seven that were 'mainly proved by documents' from the Lehrmann defamation trial.
Ms Chrysanthou added the 'damage Seven suffered was by its own hands, not (Mr Auerbach)'.
During his affidavit during the Lehmann defamation trial, Mr Auerbach alleged he acted as a 'babysitter' for Lehrmann and claimed the Seven Network covered the costs for illegal drugs, sex workers, a round of golf and meals, including a $361 Tomahawk steak in an effort to build a relationship with Lehrmann.
The former Spotlight producer also told the court the network reimbursed Lehrmann for money used at a brothel and paid for drugs in January 2023; however, he said there were no invoices available.
Mr Auerbach said his job ended in August 2023 at the expiry of his employment agreement, and he had previously 'made claim against Seven for psychological injury in which I settled on confidential terms'.
In a statement at the time of the affidavit, Seven said the network 'acted appropriately at all times' and 'did not condone or authorise the alleged payments' to Lehrmann.
In 2024, Justice Michael Lee dismissed Lehrmann's lawsuit against Network Ten and Wilkinson after he found, on the civil standard of the balance of probabilities, that the former Liberal staffer had raped Ms Higgins inside Parliament House in March 2019.
Lehrmann claimed he had been defamed by an interview aired on The Project, where Ms Higgins alleged she was raped by a colleague after a night out in Canberra.
Lehrmann stood trial in 2022 at the ACT Supreme Court, where he pleaded not guilty to sexually assaulting Ms Higgins.
The charges were subsequently dropped by the Director of Public Prosecutions due to concerns about Ms Higgins' mental health.
Lehrmann has maintained his innocence and repeatedly told the court no sexual contact occurred. An appeal against Justice Lee's decision remains before the court.
Mr Auerbach's case management hearing was adjourned to October 31.
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Epoch Times
a day ago
- Epoch Times
Network 10's The Project to End After 16-Year Run
Network 10's The Project will officially go off air on June 27 after a 16 year run. The announcement was made at the start of the June 9 episode by hosts Waleed Aly, Sarah Harris, Steve Price and Sam Taunton.
Buzz Feed
03-06-2025
- Buzz Feed
17 TV And Movie Scenes That Went Way Too Far
I'm no stranger to an uncomfy, controversial, or gory on-screen moment. Sometimes you gotta cross the line to get a point across — and that might mean including a scene that makes people squirm. As someone who worships Breaking Bad and Seven, I can understand and respect that — sometimes you just gotta put a severed head on a turtle, or in a box. WHAT'S IN THE BOOOOOOX??? But I'm sure you can also agree that there IS a line. There's certainly such thing as being too inappropriate, too gory, or too problematic, especially when the storyline appears to lack a real purpose. And today, we're gonna highlight my picks — the TV shows and movies that went TOO. FREAKIN'. FAR. In addition to BrBa and Seven, I'll also mention that I gave super-high ratings to toThe Silence of the Lambs and Fight Club (my fave movie of all time). If you're looking for credibility, there it is. I ain't no snowflake. I'll start with a more recent one. We're all aware Another Simple Favor starring Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick just came out. Well, there's a totally senseless plotline in it where Blake's character Emily has a few romantic encounters with her twin sister. Yeah, I'm serious. In the movie, the twins kiss in more than one scene. As if the first kissing scene isn't enough, later on, one sister also drugs the other, then gets on top of her and kisses her. And speaking of incest (not a phrase I ever thought I'd write on the internet), we can't NOT talk about Saxon and Lochlan from The White Lotus. I refused to jump on the bandwagon of this show solely to avoid this my mother described it to me as "the most disgusting thing" she's ever seen on TV. ICYMI, we're talking about Season 3. Saxon and Lochlan are brothers, and their relationship quickly starts becoming uncomfortably close. Their first kiss is in Episode 5, and that quickly develops into a full-blown sexual relationship. AND THEY'RE BROTHERS. Mike White, I loved you on Survivor, but can I just Perhaps the most upsetting scene I've ever seen on TV was the bathtub scene in 13 Reasons Why. The whole first season of the show is about Hannah Baker's suicide, and her "reasons why." But in a now-deleted scene, they depicted her actual suicide in way, way, way too much detail. The show, which is based on a young-adult novel, appeared to have extremely negative consequences for teens as a whole. 13 Reasons Why was actually "associated with [an] increase in youth suicide rates," which is so beyond tragic. Thankfully, they deleted the scene from the show, but I really wish younger me never saw it. Virtually every single millennial watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But perhaps you don't remember that scene in Season 6 where Spike sexually assaults Buffy. She ends up defending herself, but the whole thing is extremely uncomfortable and difficult to watch. And it's not just viewers who hate the scene. James Marsters, who plays Spike, said the show "sent [him] into therapy," and this scene is a big reason for that. "It's a problematic scene for a lot of people who like the show. And it's the darkest professional day of my life," he said. I could name so many scenes from Euphoria that I felt crossed the line, but as someone who 100% has emetophobia, that hot tub vomiting scene in Season 2 was just too much. This one is pretty self-explanatory — in the scene, Cassie, played by Sydney Sweeney, vomits all over the hot tub. And it's pretty revolting. I guess you could make arguments for why this was important, but I argue it was way too much to ever justify. Sydney Sweeney herself even said the director "just wanted vomit everywhere," and she dubbed it "the most disgusting thing [she's] ever experienced." I'll defend Glee forever and always, but I can't deny that several of those storylines were problematic. The one that consistently rubs me the wrong way is in Season 4, when Marley develops an eating disorder, largely thanks to manipulative cheerleader-slash-mean-girl Kitty. Marley ends up fainting onstage during a competition, and the whole club basically blames her for the team's disqualification. Part of the reason why this storyline bothers me so much is we don't really get any closure — and with such a serious topic, that's a massive shame. Kitty ends up revealing she essentially caused Marley's eating disorder, and because they're in a super tense situation when Kitty spills this secret, Marley basically just forgives her, and we don't hear about the situation again. Season 7 of The Walking Dead opens with a couple of excessively bloody kills, one being a fan-fave character since the show started. I won't name the characters just in case you're extremely behind on this show, but it definitely pushed boundaries in how brutal the kills were — almost to an unnecessary degree. Some fans even said these deaths were some of the bloodiest ones in the history of TV, which is a LOT to say for this show and TV in general. I get that the premise of The Walking Dead means blood and gore, but at some point, it's just excessive. Especially when it's a character we all adored so low-key felt personal. Can I be brutally honest for a sec? Virtually everything in the Fifty Shades movies can be classified as "too far" in my books. But there's perhaps one collection of scenes most people can probably agree are too much: anything that happens in the Red Room (AKA basically Christian's BDSM room). Not only are these scenes uncomfy for the audience to witness — for seemingly no reason at all — but it was also not fun for the actors themselves. "Some of the Red Room stuff was uncomfortable," Jamie Dornan admitted. "There were times when Dakota [Johnson] was not wearing much, and I had to do stuff to her that I'd never choose to do to a woman." IDK about you, but that makes me shudder. This one's an unpopular opinion, so brace yourself: The Substance. I get that this movie is a body horror, but the entire last portion, where Sue and Elizabeth "fight," ruined the entire movie for me. And I'm not the only one who thinks so. So much blood and gore, so long, and all while lacking a true point or moral, it truly feels. My disdain with this part is about more than just gore. What could've been a poignant ending that makes a profound statement about aging and feminism ended up being a blood-fight, a mockery, women's battles with aging and societal sexism reduced to a bloody outburst. And I found that even more disgusting than the blood itself. Sorry for getting all heated!!! I still love you, Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley. This is just my opinion. OK, now let's talk about Game of Thrones. You all knew this was coming, didn't you? I literally couldn't get past the first episode of this show because of all the sexual assault — not just the volume, but those scenes just seemed to last forever. Never mind all the incest, too. Again, I understand these scenes serve a purpose, but it's the excess that bothers a lot of people. There are just so many violent sexual assault and incest scenes in this show, at a certain point, you have to consider whether it's even worth watching the show as a whole. Game of Thrones is perhaps the most well-known show for its brutal sexual assault scenes, but not enough people talk about Outlander. There are a few sexual assault scenes in this show that fans think went too far — in particular, the scenes at the end of Season 1 were called "the most graphic and disturbing rape scenes ever to air in the history of television." Sam Heughan, who plays Jamie Fraser, talked about how uncomfy it was for him to shoot that part in Season 1. "The cock shot was unnecessary and did betray my trust in the creative team a bit," he said. He also noted that he didn't think the nudity added much substance to the plot: "This wasn't a moment where I felt that being naked would add to the horror of what Jamie undergoes." And as a viewer, I have to sympathize. All the sexualization of Angela in American Beauty is just awful to watch now, not least because her character is underage. Angela is supposed to be 17, a friend of protagonist Lester's (Kevin Spacey) daughter. People agree the entire movie has aged like milk, but it's especially difficult to watch Lester's dream sequence, where he fantasizes about touching Angela in ways we can all agree are extremely gross. Can I say it again? ANGELA IS UNDERAGE. Plus, it's his daughter's friend. That's not hot, it's CREEPY. The plot of the entire movie feels problematic to many of us now, but I'd like to think we should've known better when this came out in 1999. You is seriously one of my favourite shows of the past few years, so there's not much I can critique about it. But one part was a bit too gross for me: the montage in Season 2 that flips between Joe (Penn Badgley) putting a body in a meat grinder and Love (Victoria Pedretti) cooking a meal (yes, with meat in it). See what they did there? Filmography-wise, I get it, and I can appreciate it. But as a viewer, I physically couldn't watch it. Like, did we really have to see the intricate process of Joe putting a literal dead body in a meat grinder? And the connotations of Love cooking a meal at the same time hard to ignore. Several of the most renowned sitcoms of all time have pulled scenes since they first aired because of characters appearing in blackface. Namely, The Office, Scrubs, and Community — but you might not know that 30 Rock pulled a whopping FOUR episodes in 2020 because of blackface, one with John Hamm as a guest star. Tina Fey, who created the series (duh), issued an apology when the episodes were taken down. "I understand now that 'intent' is not a free pass for white people to use these images. I apologise for pain they have caused," she wrote. "Going forward, no comedy-loving kid needs to stumble on these tropes and be stung by their ugliness." I've said it before and I'll say it again: I can appreciate a raunchy joke. But I can't justify the one scene in Sausage Party that seemingly makes a sexual assault joke — with a juice box, of all things. In the scene, the bottom of an injured juice box starts leaking, and the antagonist drinks from the hole. Then he says, "If you tell anyone about this, I'm gonna deny it, bro." This is another one that deeply offends me. Who thought it was a good idea to include a (I'm assuming) sexual assault joke in an animated comedy movie? Here's the truth: it's just not funny. That line of dialogue feels disgusting and triggering, and takes the "joke" way, way, way over the edge. This one is kinda controversial, but I don't think I've ever been as passionate as when this came out. Years before "gaslighting" was a term everyone knew, we heard it on Season 17 of The Bachelorette. Yes, I'm talking about contestant Greg Grippo, who Katie Thurston accused of gaslighting. The reason I feel this went "too far" is, yeah, that's someone's (ahem, Katie's) actual trauma displayed on live TV. Greg's actions hit way too close to home for many viewers. And seeing how many people were #TeamGreg after the fact was…really disheartening. TBH, this was the reason I stopped watching The Bachelor franchise. Greg later admitted he "came off like an ass," but for me, it's too little, too late. Finally, let's chat about that absurd scene in the 2006 movie Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, where Sacha Baron Cohen pretends to kidnap Pamela Anderson. The whole thing is staged, but the audience doesn't know that, so they essentially fight to try and save Pam — which "accidentally injured" her in real life. This scene is supposed to be light, and all in good fun, but clearly there were deeper consequences we didn't see at the time. In 2019, Sacha also revealed that controversy surrounding this scene might have contributed to Pamela's divorce to Kid Rock. So yeah, this one's got a lotttt of lore. Which TV or movie scene do you think crossed the line? Maybe it was too inappropriate, gross, or problematic? Tell me in the comments below, or fill out this form to stay anonymous! And make sure to follow BuzzFeed Canada on TikTok and Instagram for more!
Los Angeles Times
02-06-2025
- Los Angeles Times
The Black Keys were nearly buried by a brutal year. A new album seeks to ‘get things back on track'
For the Black Keys, 2025 is all about getting back to doing what they love — making records and touring — on their own terms. That's their way of putting behind them the disaster that was 2024: their worst-charting album since 2006, the cancellation of an arena tour after ticket sales lagged, and the firing and public castigation of legendary manager Irving Azoff as well as their PR team. Their new album's title, 'No Rain, No Flowers,' offers a positive spin on growing from the experience, which guitarist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney echoed in our conversation ahead of their show at the Greek Theatre on Tuesday. 'This is an opportunity for us to get out of the pressure cooker of a way of touring that we realized was unsustainable and was not ideal for the fans or enjoyable for us,' says Carney. 'We like being an underdog,' Auerbach adds. The two grew up playing wiffle ball and touch football in Akron, Ohio, but were a grade apart and didn't form a band until after their brothers (who were close friends) urged them to jam together. They found power in their raw, stripped-down blues and rock and eventually formed the Black Keys. But they had to build a friendship as they were building a career. 'We'd never gone to a party together or socialized much and then we found ourselves in a van driving to shows so our friendship had a big learning curve,' Carney recalls. They started in 2001 as the quintessential indie act — their first two albums were recorded in Carney's basement — but by decade's end they were a rock band on a roll: 'Brothers,' reached No. 3 on the Billboard charts; 'El Camino' made it to No. 2 and 'Turn Blue' took them all the way to the top. Those three albums garnered 11 Grammy nominations and the band was selling out arenas and headlining Coachella. Naturally, some early fans grumbled as they moved beyond their lo-fi sound. 'I remember right before 'El Camino' thinking this might be too rock-and-roll for our base,' Carney says, 'but to me the change was a sign we weren't phoning it in.' But despite the success, the band eventually burned out. At their commercial zenith, they went on hiatus. 'We're not contrarian,' says Carney, the more voluble of the two. 'But we had accomplished all this stuff, and we felt it was time to get off of the roller coaster.' In their time apart, both men produced other artists while Auerbach also released an album with a new band, the Arcs, and a solo album, both earning critical acclaim but lower sales than the Black Keys' music. When they reunited in 2019, they say their priorities had changed. 'You can try to make another No. 1 album, but the goal became clear to us: We have this special relationship and if we want it to stay healthy the path needs to be interesting to us,' Carney says, adding that the demands of 200 on the road and the constant media obligations they'd had earlier was 'not sustainable for us at this point. It's a lot being away from your kids.' But rock's role in popular culture has continued shrinking and although the band returned to the Billboard top 10 with 'Let's Rock'; 'Delta Kream,' an album of country blues covers; and 'Dropout Boogie,' they didn't generate the same kind of attention and some fans now complained they missed the era of 'Brothers' and 'El Camino.' 'We've made it a little bit harder for ourselves,' Carney adds. 'If we had just made 'El Camino' over and over again or alternated between 'Brothers' and 'El Camino' we'd probably be playing baseball stadiums now.' But Auerbach says they always wanted to evolve similar to the bands they loved like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. 'We're music geeks who love records so that was something we aspired to,' he says. 'We didn't want to repeat ourselves so we wanted to do something different with each album.' He says that the two love seeking out obscure old singles and when they're in the studio together the goal remains the same. 'It's like when you find a song that you've never heard before that blows your mind,' he says. 'That's what we're looking for when we're working in the studio together, to re-create that feeling you get in your gut.' Auerbach adds that after starting out just the two of them in isolation — in a basement in Akron — they found they loved collaborating, working with the producer Danger Mouse on their biggest albums and, more recently, musicians like Beck, Noel Gallagher, ZZ Tops' Billy Gibbons and rapper Juicy J. That said, Carney argues that even when they've worked with collaborators, 'at the end of the day it'll sound like us. It doesn't matter who else we work with, our aesthetic is always gonna shine through.' But with the combination of the shifting music landscape and their exploring new sounds, their popularity seemed on the wane. Last year, 'Ohio Players' peaked at just 26. Then came the touring fiasco, for which they have largely blamed Azoff — who has been investigated by the Department of Justice for colluding with Live Nation (which he used to run) — saying he put the band in the wrong rooms among other things. Carney tweeted, angrily and profanely, about how the band got screwed but deleted them to avoid being sued. When they finally spoke publicly, to Rolling Stone, they confessed to being naive about how the music industry consolidation was harming bands. They called the European tour ' the most poorly orchestrated tour we had been on' and Carney said, 'we fired their a—' of Azoff's company but were more circumspect in their quotes, not saying the words 'Live Nation.' Their new publicist had called me in advance saying not to bring up these issues but to let the band do it. When that didn't happen and my time was almost up I raised the issues. After a question or two the publicist tried to shut things down, but Carney said, 'It's the L.A. Times. Let's do the interview. Come on. We're here' and talked generally about the industry being problematic. 'We're just trying to make music and tour in a f—ed up industry.' Carney says the band is now more involved in planning and is 'very methodical' about how long it'll tour and about choosing the venues, adding that the smaller venues offer a better fan experience and a less expensive one since they don't need video screens for the back of an arena. Auerbach says they're also tinkering with their setlists, though he says their catalog is now so deep they can't please everyone. 'But we definitely have our fans in mind when it comes to making selections.' As they reposition themselves and 'get things back on track,' Carney says, the duo are now in a good place despite last year. 'Our friendship is stronger than it ever has been,' he says. 'We've been through every possible thing that you can go through so we can kinda get through anything now. And there's still a lot of joy in making music together.'
