US drama The Pitt is similar enough to medical series ER for a lawsuit against its producers to progress, a court in the US has ruled.
The widow of Michael Crichton, who created ER, argues The Pitt is effectively a reboot of the series, which has been made without proper permission or credit.
Sherri Crichton says her husband’s contract included a “frozen rights” provision that prohibited any spin-offs, sequels or reboots of ER being made without his express consent.
A three-judge panel said there are “clear and numerous similarities between The Pitt and ER,” which means the case can go ahead. Warner Bros previously described the lawsuit as “baseless” and sought to have it dismissed.
Listing the similarities between the two shows, the court cited the emergency room setting, the fast pace, use of medical jargon, graphic depictions of injuries, and younger doctors fresh from medical school being trained.
“We find the details here suffice for a prima facie case,” the judges said.
It means the case will now go to a jury trial in Los Angeles Superior Court.
It’s a standard medical show, that focuses on the ER, like a million other shows. The only connection is Noah Wylie, so he’s now prohibited from doing a medical show because it will be considered a spin-off of a show he did decades ago? As a juror, I would find that to be stupid.
Isn’t Michael Chriton’s widow wealthy enough?
How many kidneys does Wylie’s character have?
If it is more than one and he has no scars from a transplant then he is not Carter.
I can name 10 shows matching those criteria…
Bro what?
No they aren’t. These two shows are about as close as Gilligan’s Island and Lost. Both shows are about a group of people lost an island but that’s about it. Same here.
Oh no, not medical jargon and depictions of injuries in a medical show. It must be copyright infringement there’s no other explanation for it.
They should probably sue Scrubs next.
I have the copyright on “Stat!” I get $100 everyone someone says it.
Or Grey’s anatomy.
Doesn’t sound like it’s about copyright infringement, just contract law.
The studio negotiated at first but then just went ahead without receiving authorization for a reboot from the estate holding that veto right.
It hasn’t got any of the same characters as ER, it shot in the completely different manner, it’s not even setting the same country as ER.
Apart from that comment not being a refutation of anything I said:
Since when are Pittsburgh and Chicago in different countries?
Youd have to be the Marvin Gaye estate to think that the pitt is plagiarising er…
This is the start of a dangerous precedent that may allow a circus to sue the court for copyright infringement on the grounds that it’s full of clowns.
Wait, the Librarian is also a doctor?
Dude if you haven’t seen The Pitt yet, do yourself a favor and watch it ASAP.
It’s some of the best TV currently on. It’s early to say, but I’ve seen some go as far to potentially put it up there with the likes of The Sopranos and The Wire.
Personally, I’ll give it another season or two before making a claim like that. But the show is outstanding imo
It’s easily on the same level with Sopranos, Wire, Breaking Bad, etc. Astonishingly good.
Libarians are really smart, cuz they’re quiet.
Listing the similarities between the two shows, the court cited the emergency room setting, the fast pace, the use of medical jargon, graphic depictions of injuries and younger doctors fresh from medical school being trained.
With the exception (maybe) of the younger training doctors, though I imagine doctors gotta learn, everything described there is a definitional part of a medical drama set in an emergency room. I understand the court letting this move forward because there may be good reason to explore the more detailed similarities. But the ones they listed there… that is baseless.
You cannot copyright a real world setting or genre. The subject matter of emergency room medicine is not owned by Michael Crichton, Warner Brothers, or anyone. Would be like saying the creator of Honeymooners owns the rights to domestic abuse. ER’s copyright encompasses its characters, and specific stories. Not the entire concept of an ER or triage medicine. It did not create any of those concepts. It also doesn’t own the style of narrative, pacing, editing, cinematography, etc. used, either.
It’s also shot in a totally different way that is obvious, even to people who don’t understand tv production. If there had been no mention of ER, NOBODY would make the connection.
It sounds like they had this medical show with Noah Wylie, and someone had the bright idea of shortcutting the promotion by tying to a beloved old show he’d been in. There was really no connection, but if it could make the show get accepted faster, it would be worth it. So they float the idea, but move forward anyway, because the project doesn’t rely on the ER connection.
Later, the Estate claims the ER connection was everything because of course they do.
With the exception (maybe) of the younger training doctors, though I imagine doctors gotta learn, everything described there is a definitional part of a medical drama set in an emergency room.
And the training doctors are an audience insert, so that characters can explain shit that would be obvious for anyone who is actually at home in the setting.
TiL Michael Crichton wrote ER.
…and that he’s dead!
Coincidence? I think not.
Good to know we’ll never have any new TV shows based in an emergency room ever again
This bullshit! How judges going rule this is a reboot. Fuck the judge with cactus. Now this great show will get canceled. But come on better cancel or pay out for every single hospital show. Fucking cunt just like her asshole husband. Hope they fight this and bury her in court fees.
Edit: wife called it exact comparison Grey’s Anatomy would fit all the same criteria. Why didn’t the bitch sue creator of that show?
It’s because the showrunners of The Pitt worked on E.R and were in talks with Crichton’s widow to make a sequel, but the network didn’t want to pay the royalties she was asking for. So they pivoted to making an original medical drama that was very similar to E.R, hence her suing them.
Which will easily get defeated when they can point to something like Grey’s and the lack of legal action.
Is Grey’s based in an emergency room setting? Does it share key actors and staff? What about Scrubs? House?
Is it pure coincidence that a bunch of ER alumni happen to create a completely unrelated show that happens to feature the comings and goinga of doctors in an emergency room?
I would argue that just because you wanted to do a reboot and then couldn’t do reboot and did something else instead isn’t really evidence in and of itself.
Star Wars was of course supposed to be a flash Gordon reboot but no one seems to care about that.
If I pitch a cop drama that doesn’t get made does that prohibit me as a producer from ever having anything to do with cop dramas ever again? I have to stick to musicals for the rest of my life and hope that one of those never gets denied.
Valid points that the Pitt should just lean into. “We wanted to do a sequel. We couldn’t come to terms. We dropped any ER (the show) based stuff and kept all the ER medical stuff.”
Does 24 have standing to sue because they did the 1 hour per show format?
“We find the details here suffice for a prima facie case,” the judges said.
Pretty early there to say it will get “easily” defeated, when the judges have found that there is a credible claim
That’s not what that says. That’s basically saying it’s not frivolous. The actual arguments will happen in the trial this ruling is allowing.
Those are the same thing at this stage
No the judge is being reasonable while you are being OTT. As others have said, there were talks to make a reboot/sequel to ER which fell through and ER was directly adapted from a Michael Crichton script. The key is the same producers went on anyway to make a show that even used a same principle actor because they allegedly didn’t want to pay for the rights.
The judge has only ruled that there is a case to hear on face value. It may well be that once the facts are heard, the producers and Warner Brothers win. It may well be that the producers lose and are felt to have effectively made the same show anyway, and owe the estate money.
It’s important to remember that ER is directly based on a script written by Michael Crichton who was a medical student in an emergency room prior to being a writer. Steven Spielberg took the script and developed it with John Wells and the pilot for ER is pretty much that script, barely changed. It’s not some tenuous connection - it is effectively Michael Crichton’s show as much as the other original producers, no matter how much it changed over 15 seasons.
This is not about making shows based in Emergency Rooms. This purely about whether this show is actually a sequel to ER that has been changed a little to get away from paying one of the original producers estates. If it had not been the exact same producers who were discussing making a sequel to ER, then there likely wouldn’t have been a case.
The Pitt’s executive producers include: John Wells, an executive producer on ER, R Scott Gemmil a writer & producer on ER and Noah Wyle an actor on ER. At face value that is quite the coincidence, especially when they also pitched a reboot of ER.
Nothing of the sort was ruled. There hasn’t been any substantial proceedings at all. The only thing that has been decided is that there is enough of a plausible claim to proceed with a case.
Perhaps there is nothing there but an ER-based medical drama featuring a common actor and some common show runners and staff. Perhaps discovery will uncover some damning evidence of (surprise) TV evecs being shitty people and trying to screw over creators of an IP.
Time will tell
Legal Eagle has video on it from a couple months ago.
tl;dr the most damning evidence to the layman is they actually approached the estate about a reboot/spinoff that fell through before all of a sudden the Pitt happened
Yeah but if that’s the entirety of their evidence they’re going to have to really hope that they’ve got something in Discovery. Because I can totally envision and utterly innocent series of events that would also result in The Pitt coming about.
- Old producers of ER are looking for some work so they approach about doing a reboot.
- Talks begin but ultimately fall through and the show never gets created.
- The producers are there for still looking for a new show to do so start to come up with their own IP.
- Given that they have history in the medical industry it makes sense to make another show based in the medical industry. It’s not like there going to do a period piece or anything.
- They write an original IP story based in the medical industry.
- They pitched it, and it gets produced. One of the benefits being that it is original IP, and they don’t have to give any credit to anyone and therefore the show is cheaper to produce.
A logical series of events that lead to a similar show being produced after engaging with talks to produce a reboot of the show ER, but all totally innocent and not evidence of IP theft.
This might surprise you but I didn’t sum up a multi-million dollar court case in a couple sentences
They could have chosen not to cast Noah Wyle. I legit thought it was a sequel to ER.
So an actor is only allowed to be in one show and then they have to retire?
That’s kinda like saying Michael Imperioli couldn’t take a role as a mob boss because he played Christopher Moltisanti and that would make it a Sopranos spin-off.
Or Lorne Michaels suing every show Pete Davidson is in for being Pete Davidson in the show.
Well the secret there is that all of those shows and movies are actually produced by Michaels’ production company and he’s not gonna sue himself.
Sure. Just providing an outside perspective. I haven’t watched either show, and that’s the connection I made.
Right, but Allison Janney and Bradley Whitford were both in The West Wing. Now they’re both in The Diplomat playing characters in the White House. But that doesn’t make the Diplomat a sequel to the West Wing.
It would make me think so at first. Like, I wondered if Rob Lowe was going to get involved when I read that Janney and whitford were doing a political drama together.
It’s not enough to win the case, but I absolutely agree that there’s enough there to bring the case.
If you watch enough television shows you will see actors that used to work together working together again.
Yes, but same actors and same topic is less common. Hence the “at first.”
The Pitt was supposed to be a sequel and the bearded guy was supposed to play doctor Carter again but they didn’t get the rights so they changed his name.
So yes, it was thought of as a reboot but it’s not actually a reboot. This lawsuit is idiotic.
(also, The Pitt sux)
well duh because the showrunner/lead is in the original ER drama.
You ever been so out of the loop that this article is where you found out that Michael Crichton died?
I’ll see your ‘found out via article’ and raise you a ‘found out in a comment on said article’
That’s meta as fuck
Not as meta as: I just found out from this comment chain
Holy shit, man. It was in 2009…
lmao, I literally just said “Michael Crichton died??” to my husband when I read the bit about his widow. Apparently in 2008.
grays anatomy:
Gray’s wasn’t/isn’t solely based in the ER, a lot in the OR and patient rooms. There are also numerous other medical dramas before and since that haven’t been sued.
As someone who never saw ER i wonder if these broad descriptions are enough for the claim to succeed with a jury. A key point is probably going to be that Noah Wyle was in ER and in talks for a sequel that the estate shutdown before The Pitt.
