A screenwriter sued Alexander Payne on Wednesday, alleging that the script for “The Holdovers” was based on his unproduced screenplay set at a children’s hospital.
The suit contends that there are 46 “matched incidents” in the plots of the two scripts. As described in the complaint, Stephenson’s script, “Frisco,” tells the story of a dispirited doctor at the hospital who is stuck looking after a precocious teenage patient. The two develop a friendship on a trip to San Francisco, culminating in the doctor’s decision to quit his job and set off on a cross-country trek.
The lawsuit argues that the similarities with “The Holdovers” are more than mere coincidence, and that the structure and incidents of “Frisco” “were meticulously transposed into ‘The Holdovers,’ with surface cosmetic details changed.”
“Screenplays are often called the blueprint for a film,” the lawsuit states. “The Defendants built their film using ‘Frisco’ as their blueprint.”
