Lena Headey’s former agency suing her over her cut role in Thor 4

Lena Headey, best known for playing the indomitable Cersei Lannister on Game of Thrones, is being sued by her former U.K. agency Troika (now YMU) over fees it says she owes them, according to Variety. Specifically, they say she owes them $500,000 for her role in Thor: Love and Thunder (her scenes ended up getting cut, so she’s not in the finished movie). That’s equivalent to 7% of what Headey got paid for the part.

Okay, doing the math, that means that Headey got paid north of $7 million for a role in Thor 4 that was apparently so unimportant Disney was able to lift it right out of the movie without much trouble. That is bonkers. How much money does Disney have? How much money does Headey need?

Honestly, that’s the biggest “mind blown” moment for me out of this whole story, but let’s continue, cause there’s more. Troika also wants $300,000 for Headey’s role in the movie 9 Bullets and $650,000 for the Showtime series Rita; Headey was set to play the title character in that one, but only filmed a pilot since the show wasn’t picked up. Troika also wants damages for breach of contract, interest and reimbursement of legal fees.

Game of Thrones veteran Lena Headey was cut out of Thor: Love and Thunder

Headey, for her part, joined Troika in 2005 when her personal rep, Michael Duff, left Lou Carl Associates to found it. Duff left the company in 2020, a couple years after it was acquired by a private equity group, and Headey soon followed. In defending herself against Troika’s claims, she says that neither Troika nor Duff negotiated her roles in Thor: Love and Thunder or 9 Bullets; in the case of Thor 4, director Taika Waititi approached her directly. As for Rita, she says she got paid $325,000 for the pilot and already gave Troika its 7% fee of $22,750.

She also claims that she never signed a contract with Troika or with Duff, and that both parties are relying on an oral agreement made when Duff was still at Lou Carl Associates in the late 1990s. It sounds like Troika has an uphill battle.

But even if it goes south for Headey, she can afford it. After all, I heard she got paid over $7 million for a movie she’s not even in.

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