LOS ANGELES — The estate of mega-selling author Michael Crichton filed suit against Warner Bros. Television, actor Noah Wyle and producer John Wells for breach of contract over the reboot of the blockbuster series “ER.”
According to the complaint filed Tuesday in Los Angeles Superior Court, the Crichton estate spent nearly a year unsuccessfully negotiating with Warner Bros. for the right to reboot the celebrated medical drama that ran on NBC.
When the parties did not reach an agreement, the studio “simply moved the show from Chicago to Pittsburgh, rebranded it ‘The Pitt,’ and has plowed ahead without any attribution or compensation for Crichton and his heirs,” the lawsuit alleges.
The move is a “callous disregard for Crichton’s inception of ‘ER,’ ” a “personal betrayal” of a 30-year friendship between the author and Wells, the original series’ showrunner, and “an effort to rob his heirs of the fruits of one of his greatest creations,” the complaint states.