What happens when one of the most successful soccer players turned co-owner of the MLS soccer team Inter Miami FC sues one of the most successful movie action stars in Hollywood? You get a huge lawsuit with more plot twists than a Quentin Tarantino movie.

To understand how we go here it helps to go back to where it all began, and to do that let me set the scene.

Mark Wahlberg is an exercise fanatic. The man wakes up at 4 AM to get his first work out of the day, before going into his home office or arriving on set of one of his action movies. In 2019 he became enamored with a new fitness company called F45 Training that is designed to use different energy systems for a maximum burn during curated cardio workouts. They use the comradery and energy of a group to build a cohesive workout that not only builds muscle, but boosts metabolism. 

Mark Wahlberg was so into F45 workouts that he recruited his family and a lot of his famous friends to attend with him at these pre-dawn workouts. 

Then in 2019 Mark Wahlberg invested in F45 Training to purchase a 36 percent interest in F45 Training.

That brings us to David Beckham, who in May of 2023 first filed a lawsuit against F45 Training, Wahlberg’s investment firm named Mark Wahlberg Investment Group, and F45’s founders Adam Gilchrist and Rob Deutsch, who launched the company in 2012 in Australia.

David Beckham’s issue with Mark Wahlberg stems from a purported agreement for F45 to pay $10 million dollars to be an ambassador to F45 Training. In court documents David Beckham claimed he was “duped” by Mark Wahlberg and F45 Training into signing the endorsement deal.

How does someone “dupe” a soccer superstar into signing a $10 million dollars endorsement deal?!?! Seems like a great deal if you ask me!

Mark Wahlberg became friends with David Beckham when the soccer star moved to Los Angeles and bought a home in the same neighborhood that Mark Wahlberg lived in. Both being celebrities, they rolled in the same circles, and their family’s became close. These days neither celebrity still lives in Los Angeles, with Mark Wahlberg having moved his family to Las Vegas, and David Beckham splits his time with his family in London where he’s originally from and Miami, Florida where he is co-owner of the MLS Inter Miami FC soccer team.

Back to the lawsuit.

David Beckham claims he was never paid the $10 million dollars, nor did he ever receive any of the allegedly promised stocks as compensation. That might turn out to have been fortunate, since F45’s stock has plummeted to $0.15 cents a share down from their high of $17.28 when they went public in an IPOs back in July of 2021 and F45 Training was valued at $1.4 billion dollars. I should know, because I was an investor in their IPO through Robinhood, but I’ve got diamond hands and still own the stock solely because I’m a huge fan of Mark Wahlberg.

So what do I think will happen next with David Beckham’s lawsuit against Mark Wahlberg’s investment company and F45 Training? I’m guessing they’ll settle out of court in a few years after the lawsuit winds its way through the courts, and in the end it’ll be the lawyers who will be the only ones who’ll make money off this deal.

David Beckham Sues Mark Wahlberg’s Fitness Brand for $10 Million