My advice to Johnny Depp

Are any of you tired of reading about Ghislaine Maxwell and her sleazy life? Bored by old news repeated ad nauseam by people who hadn’t — and still don’t have — a clue? Well, your intrepid High life correspondent does have a clue, so here goes.

But before I go on about la Maxwell, a few thoughts about the drama taking place in Court No. 13 of the Royal Courts of Justice on the Strand, where I had the leading role in a 1986 drama — also starring Charles Moore and some lesser characters — that almost broke the poor little Greek boy and also impoverished our great ex-proprietor Algy Cluff.

As readers of this column surely know, I loathe Hollywood types, those preening, egomaniacal popinjays adored and worshipped by brain-dead zombies known as fans, treated as superheroes by tabloid and TV slime merchants posing as journalists. There are exceptions, of course, and among them is a man I’ve never met, but whom people I respect speak highly of: Johnny Depp. Yes, I know, it looks bad for him right now, and worse is yet to come when Amber Heard gives testimony. But from what I hear from people whom I respect and who know him, Depp is an innocent, a very nice person, a man trusting enough of lawyers to sue a major British tabloid not knowing what this involves.

Well, I’ll tell you in a jiffy: once you’re inside the court, a lawyer can suggest anything about you, as I have to my regret discovered. (I’ve never sued but have been sued many times.) It’s all privileged, Wild West stuff, and there’s nothing one can do about it.