Lorraine Kelly has spilled the beans on receiving a stern legal notice regarding Coleen Rooney and Rebekah Vardy.
During her ITV programme, Lorraine warned her audience that she’s been urged not to speak about their infamous ‘Wagatha Christie’ trial as Coleen continues her stint in the I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! jungle.
It all comes after Rebekah and Coleen’s much publicised courtroom drama over sending stories to the press from a private social media account.
Despite appearing on ‘I’m A Celebrity’ herself back in 2017, Rebekah launched a defamation lawsuit against Coleen, 38, which collapsed when, in July 2022, the High Court ruled the allegations “substantially true”, reports the Mirror.
On Tuesday’s edition of ‘Lorraine’, the host chatted about the recent ‘I’m A Celebrity’ antics but highlighted the advice against using ‘Wagatha Christie’. Teaming up with Rishi Davda on air, Lorraine admitted: “Now this is very serious Rishi, we’ve had some advice from our lawyers that we can’t actually say Wagatha Christie.”
She went on to reveal an unexpected titbit: “We can’t say Wagatha Christie because it’s owned by someone, so every time we say Wagatha Christie we have to pay Rebekah Vardy a pound.”
Giggling over the situation, Rishi responded with uncertainty about the cost: “I don’t know the going rate actually.”
Lorraine playfully suggested they must find an alternative moniker: “So we’ll have to call it something else, what can we call it?” To which Rishi mischievously countered: “We can abbreviate it to WC.”
Vardy, who lost her libel case against Rooney last year, has trademarked the name ‘Wagatha Christie’. According to documents obtained by the Mirror, the trademark covers a wide range of areas including clothing, non-alcoholic beverages, broadcasting, education and beauty.
If anyone else wants to use it, they’ll need Rebekah’s approval and she could also charge a fee for its use. When asked by the Mirror about her thoughts on the nickname and the possibility of being remembered differently, perhaps as a jungle queen, Coleen responded: “I think I’d rather just be known as Coleen from Liverpool. Not from any other type of place. It’s just me, as I always have been, so hopefully people just think she’s that Scouser that she’s always been.”
However, Rebekah didn’t hesitate to share her views on Coleen’s appearance on the show.
After Coleen entered the camp, Rebekah posted a photo of herself relaxing in a pink bikini with her eyes closed, captioning it: “The feeling when you are living rent free in people’s heads.”
She added a laughing-crying emoji and a winking emoji to her post. Last month, a judge ruled that Rebekah must pay an additional £100,000 on top of the £1.8 million she’s already been ordered to pay Coleen following the infamous trial.
Nicola McLean, a friend of both women, believes Rebekah would seize every opportunity to watch Coleen and gleefully report on her failures in the show.
“I admire strong women and both of these girls are strong in different ways. Can’t wait to see Coleen in the jungle and can’t wait to see what Rebekah Vardy has got to say about it,” she expressed her excitement.
Meanwhile, Rebekah didn’t hold back on her opinions regarding another campmate, as she slammed BBC Radio 1’s Dean McCullough for his apparent alliance with Coleen, saying: “Dean, Dean and his cosying up to Coleen. It’s so very obvious and, believe me, it is going to get tiresome. He absolutely loves to talk about Wagatha and when he does he knows he’s going to get airtime from it,” vented Rebekah in The Sun.
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