Hollywood icon Johnny Depp claims his ex-wife Amber Heard “punched him twice in the face” for being late to her birthday party.

The allegation emerged in legal documents as the Pirates of the Caribbean star sues a newspaper in the High Court.

The actor was livid at a report claiming he is a wife-beater and criticising his casting in Harry Potter spin-off Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.

In papers Depp’s lawyers lodged in the Queen’s Bench Division, they say he arrived two hours late for Heard’s birthday dinner in April 2016. They claim after the guests left, Heard, 32, “began criticising the claimant for being late”.

According to the papers, Depp was “not drunk or high on drugs” and had gone to bed when “Ms Heard, who had been drinking, became aggressive and violent... punching him twice in the face”.

Depp, 55, “defended himself by grabbing Ms Heard’s arms to stop her punching again and told her to stop”.

The papers add: “He pushed her away on to the bed and told her he was leaving and that she should not follow him.”

(Image: Getty)

The next month, the pair rowed again and reports at the time claimed Depp threw a mobile in Heard’s face. A photo emerged of her with bruises. But as part of his case, Depp’s team submitted depositions by two police officers who say they saw no marks on her when they were called to the scene.

The papers add: “When one of the officers asked Ms Heard what had happened she responded ‘nothing’.”

The court documents claim Depp’s security guards rushed into his penthouse when they heard Heard shouting.

They claim: “The security observed [Depp] standing in the kitchen, far away from Ms Heard. At that moment, Ms Heard yelled, ‘Stop hitting me, Johnny’ into the phone. The claimant was not hitting Ms Heard. Ms Heard was about 25 feet away.”

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(Image: Reuters) (Image: Getty)

Depp and Heard met in 2009 and were romantically linked in June 2012. They reached an out of court divorce settlement in August 2016.

An attorney for Heard said last night: “These allegations are totally false. One needs only read the recent Rolling Stone article about Mr Depp and the lawsuit filed against him by a location manager, among many other recent news stories and lawsuits, to understand his state of mind.”