EXCLUSIVE: Warner Bros TV this week filed to dismiss a lawsuit by Michael Crichton’s estate that alleged the studio cut the late ER creator out of a new series by changing the venue to an inner-city hospital in Pittsburgh called The Pitt. The new show has the same EP in John Wells, showrunner R. Scott Gemmill and star Noah Wyle who were part of the ER talks, with the Crichton estate left out. WBTV claimed that the medical drama is completely different from ER, adding that “plaintiff cannot use Mr. Crichton’s ER contract as a speech-stifling weapon to prevent Defendants from ever making a show about emergency medicine.”
In response, Crichton’s widow, Sherri Crichton, here gives Deadline her first interview on the matter. She answered a series of questions I submitted, and she tells a decidedly different version of events. Right after that, WBTV responds. Buckle up.
DEADLINE: Warner Bros. filed for dismissal, claiming that The Pitt is a completely different show from the ER sequel it had been negotiating with the estate. How can you prove otherwise?
SHERRI CRICHTON: Let me explain how this began. I’m with my family on Thanksgiving eve 2022 and my phone rings. It’s John Wells, and he informs me that there is going to be story in Deadline in the next few days announcing an ER reboot starring Noah Wyle. I was shocked. Although development had clearly begun long before, no one had mentioned anything to me. Even John was not asking for my opinion or approval, he was simply giving me a heads up about an imminent press announcement. So this is how we were treated from the start. I could not believe that John and Warner Bros. would treat Michael and his legacy that way.
As you can imagine, I immediately asked to see Michael’s contract and saw that he shared a “frozen rights” provision with Steven Spielberg and Warner Bros., meaning that nothing beyond ER — no sequels, spinoffs, or anything else derivative of the original series — could proceed except with the express consent of all three parties. John’s call and eleventh-hour notification was a flagrant violation of the contract. I know John would have never done this to Michael if he were alive, not for a second.
I was excited at the prospect of an ER reboot, and my representatives immediately began engaging with John and Warner Bros. Warner Bros. acknowledged Michael’s frozen rights, including that they now belonged to the estate, and promised that they would not proceed without our blessing, express permission and a new contract.
That assurance from Warner Bros. was very important to me because only a few years earlier Warner Bros. had produced a television adaptation of Westworld for HBO but had deliberately stripped Michael of his created by credit, despite the fact that he had created the idea, written the original screenplay and directed the film. Adding insult to injury, Warner Bros. had placed Michael’s ‘based on’ credit not in the opening titles, where it almost always appears, but instead buried in the back of the end credits. It was a horrible insult to Michael, an author who had sold three hundred million books and a creator and writer who had made Warner Bros. billions of dollars from ER to Disclosure to Twister. I was deeply upset and Michael’s fans all over the world were outraged. I could not let that happen again on ER. In an email to me, John Wells agreed that what Warner Bros. and HBO did to Michael on Westworld was “deplorable.” He promised me that Michael would not be treated like this on the ER reboot.
We then negotiated in good faith with Warner Bros. and John Wells for nearly a year. When they broke off negotiations last October, they told us the project was dead. Nobody wanted the show. Maybe we could revisit in 5-10 years. I believed them at the time. But the project wasn’t dead. They simply changed the name and moved it to Pittsburgh.
Warner Bros. is intimately acquainted with the facts of this case, and so are John Wells, Noah Wyle, Scott Gemmill and the executives at Warner Bros. Noah Wyle stood on the picket lines during the WGA strike and said he stood behind writers and creators but when it came to ER he stabbed Michael Crichton in the back and betrayed everything Michael had done for him.
I don’t think they expected me to take legal action but I was left with no choice. I am protecting Michael’s extraordinary legacy of work and the rights of his children and standing up for creators who cannot stand up for themselves. This is what Michael would have wanted and expected of me.
DEADLINE: Warner Bros claims that the “Plaintiff cannot use Mr. Crichton’s ER contract as a speech-stifling weapon to prevent Defendants from ever making a show about emergency medicine?” How do you respond?
CRICHTON: This case is not about whether someone can produce a medical drama, or even a medical drama starring Noah Wyle. We would not have filed a lawsuit over that. This case is about whether Warner Bros., John Wells, Scott Gemmill, and Noah Wyle can develop and negotiate with the estate for nearly a year to do an ER reboot and, when they don’t get their way, pass off the same show under a different name as something “completely new and original” that derives in no way from Michael’s signature creation, and for which his estate is therefore owed nothing.
When I first spoke to John, he denied that the ER reboot had been in development for quite some time and made it appear that this was all new. But subsequent personal letters from Noah Wyle to me revealed that development on an ER reboot had actually been underway for nearly two years. Noah’s letters completely contradicted John’s version of events which was very troubling. Why would John lie to me? I could not understand it. When John eventually did disclose the top-level creative for the reboot, he described it as follows:
“A twelve hour shift. An hour an episode that spills over into a fourteen hour shift. Michael’s original screenplay (our pilot episode) was a day in the life of the ER and Mark Greene (Anthony Edwards). Thirty years later, it was to be a fourteen hour shift for John Carter (Noah Wyle) now the attending physician in the ER. … The idea was to show the continuing collapse of public hospital emergency room care as chronic homelessness, fentanyl, and the aftermath of the pandemic have eroded the public health system. We would see Carter arrive for the beginning of his shift, follow him through the fourteen hours of his day, considering whether he can keep doing this work, and watch him regain his purpose and recommit to his profession.”
Warner Bros. and John negotiated with the estate for ten months for that reboot. They terminated those negotiations last October. Warner Bros. and John would have you believe that they then went back to the drawing board and months later came up with something “completely new and original” that has nothing in common with ER or the planned reboot except that it takes place in a hospital and stars Noah Wyle. But it wasn’t months later, or even weeks later. Instead, according to the timeline in Warner Bros.’ latest filing, The Pitt sprung into existence literally over the course of a weekend. Let me say that again — after a year of negotiating with us, and within just 72 hours of our negotiations breaking down, the same writer, actor, executive producer, production company, and studio had created a show that had nothing in common with the planned reboot except that it was set in a hospital and starred Noah Wyle. I found that absurd.
We did not file this suit in the dark. We read the pilot script. The Pitt is not St. Elsewhere, Chicago Hope, Grey’s Anatomy, or The Good Doctor. It is the same ER derivative that had been in development for more than two years, but stripping the estate of credit and compensation for Michael’s signature creation.
DEADLINE: How did you feel when you learned that the same team were doing a medical procedural in another city?
CRICHTON: I felt it was a tremendous betrayal not just by John but also by Noah and Scott and Warner Bros. ER was Michael’s creation and the show grossed more than $3 billion for Warner Bros. It launched Noah’s career. John claimed to be Michael’s friend. This is inappropriate behavior. I understand their financial motive. Simply put, Warner Bros. can produce this series for far less without paying Michael, but without Michael there would be no ER and there would be no The Pitt. And by removing Michael they also remove Steven Spielberg and Amblin. They save a lot of money — tens of millions on the front end, and multiples of that in success. But they made a contract with Michael when they acquired the rights to ER and they have to live up to their promises. It’s not just what the law requires, it’s the right thing to do.
DEADLINE: Why did negotiations with the estate crater? Was it the ask for money, or credit?
CRICHTON: Warner Bros. wants to say it was all about money but that’s wrong. It was a number of things but the most important thing was honoring Michael, respecting his contract and protecting Michael’s legacy. We were making progress in the negotiations until April 11, 2023, when Warner Bros. gave us a contract that they demanded be signed the same day. They wanted David Zaslav to be able to announce the new ER series at a press gathering where HBO Max was being rebranded to Max and Harry Potter and other new shows were being announced, and their deadline was based on that. I needed more than a few hours to review a lengthy and detailed contract, but Warner Bros. didn’t care about that. It was take it now or forget it. It felt like bullying.
Negotiations did resume a few months later, but the promise to give Michael created by credit was gone. That was a non-starter for me. John Wells had previously agreed to put up a penalty payment if Michael did not receive sole credit, but no more. They just pulled it along with a lot of other terms we had spent months negotiating. And when we asked to restore those points, they terminated the negotiations and told us the project was dead. I was disappointed with that result but honestly believed, per Michael’s contract and Warner Bros. and John’s personal assurances to me, they would not proceed with the show. Obviously, I was wrong.
This is not a new playbook for Warner Bros. and it’s truly frightening. Negotiate with the heirs and if negotiations fail, just create a clone using the same cast, writers, and producers so that you don’t have to pay the creator or his family anything. It’s theft and it should scare the hell out of every creator out there.
Here’s an analogy someone shared with me: Imagine if Paramount approached Mario Puzo’s estate to do a sequel to the The Godfather with Al Pacino coming back to star. The estate engages and they negotiate back and forth for a year but ultimately negotiations breakdown. Now imagine the Puzo family clicks Deadline one day and reads that Paramount is making that same sequel, but the organized crime family is now called the Cabreze’s instead of the Corleone’s, and it’s set in Chicago instead of New York or Las Vegas. It’s the same creative team and the same storyline they had pitched the Puzo family. And when the Puzo family sues, Paramount’s official statement is “…well you can’t stop us from making all organized crime films,” completely ignoring that the studio spent a year negotiating not for some organized crime film but for that very film. That’s a good analogy of what has happened here. You can’t do a James Bond film without the Broccoli family. You can’t do a Godfather sequel without the Puzo family. And you cannot do an ER sequel without Michael Crichton’s family. That’s what The Pitt is.
DEADLINE: Why did the estate not sue when Michael Crichton was not listed as the Westworld creator on the series based on his movie? In hindsight, do you think letting that go created an expectation that once again you would not litigate against The Pitt?
CRICHTON: What happened on Westworld was horribly wrong, but Michael’s contract was different. He didn’t have frozen rights. Still, the pattern is the same. If they can strip Michael Crichton, one of the world’s most successful authors and writers, of his rightful created by credit, they can strip any artist or creator of credit. And now Warner Bros. wants to do that even in the face of Michael’s frozen rights. I brought this lawsuit not only to protect Michael’s rights, but also to stand for all creators and the families of creators who this has happened to and who this will continue to happen to unless someone steps forward and stops them.
DEADLINE: Noah Wyle’s ER character was an avatar for Michael Crichton’s experience as a med student earning his stripes at a busy hospital and the other plaintiffs worked with your late husband on the show. How personal is this and what do you feel they owed you as his widow, and his son?
This is all deeply personal for me. John and Noah wrote me a number of long letters to convince me to move forward with the ER reboot. These were very personal letters where they talked eloquently about how much Michael meant to them and how much he changed their lives. Michael wasn’t just the inspiration for Noah’s character; he was the character. For those same supposed friends to attempt to strip Michael of his second greatest creation behind Jurassic Park is horribly and unforgivably wrong. I cannot believe these men, who made millions upon millions off of Michael’s creation, would do this to him. It’s terrible. I know for a fact that they would not do this to Michael if he were alive and I cannot fathom why they felt it was okay to do this to his wife and children after his death. Why is Warner Bros. doing this? I’m fighting for my late husband and his children. I’m fighting because this is wrong and Michael would never stand for it.
DEADLINE: These suits usually get settled before they come to court. What do your lawyers have to offer up in the way of discovery that will make journalists like myself salivate, and prove you have been wronged?
CRICHTON: I’m very confident about our case. It may take some time but the ugly truth is going to come out. There will be a clear record of emails, text messages, contract drafts, and other critical documents and evidence that prove our case. This is not about oh we are just doing another medical show. This is about negotiating with the estate for nearly a year to reboot ER and when Warner Bros. could not get the terms it wanted, turning around and doing the same show under another name. I am confident that when a jury hears the facts of this case they will find in our favor and send a message to Warner Bros. and other companies that this type of behavior is not acceptable. The truth will prevail and there have to be consequences.
Warner Bros Television replied in this statement:
“Ms. Crichton’s lawsuit against WBD lacks both factual and legal foundation. Ms. Crichton’s description of the timeline and content of our negotiations about a potential ER reboot are incorrect, and we strongly deny her allegations. Importantly, The Pitt does not include any ER intellectual property and is no more similar to ER than is Grey’s Anatomy, Chicago Med, or any of the countless other hospital medical dramas that have aired since or before ER.”
