01/29/2007
Author Files $250 Million Lawsuit Against Brokeback Mountain Filmmakers
Janice Scott-Blanton, author of My Husband is on the Down Low and I Know About It, has filed a $250 million copyright infringement lawsuit against the makers of Brokeback Mountain claiming similarities between scenes in the movie and scenes from her novel, according to Black News.
"To support her allegations, Scott-Blanton has cataloged over 50 substantial similarities between the two bodies of work; these similarities range from subtle to the stark."
Scott-Blanton claims that scenes in a bar, bedroom, and kitchen in the movie have been lifted from her work, which Amazon lists as having a publication date of March 2005.
One wonders if Scott-Blanton is aware that Brokeback is adapted from a short story by Annie Proulx first published in The New Yorker in 1997.
Posted 12:52 PM EST by Andy Towle in Books, Brokeback Mountain, News | Permalink
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What an idiot! The movie follows the short story EXACTLY! If anything was lifted then she was the one doing the lifting...how sad for her.
Posted by: Wayne | Jan 29, 2007 12:57:19 PM
People will do ANYTHING to get publicity - Towleroad is playing right into this creepy bitch's hand by promoting her and her book. Obviously the lawsuit has no basis - unfortunately just as anyone can have a baby, anyone can file a lawsuit.
Posted by: BeeDee | Jan 29, 2007 1:06:45 PM
I once had sex in a pup tent with my best friend.
As such, I'm also filing a lawsuit against the filmmakers of Brokeback Mountain. Clearly, they stole portions of my life without crediting me.
Posted by: chrisb | Jan 29, 2007 1:07:55 PM
I forgot to add: BOOO, Andy. Don't be a tool for this kind of crap!
Posted by: BeeDee | Jan 29, 2007 1:07:59 PM
What a RETARD!
Hey, if anyone is in the Oklahoma area, we are having a "Don't Ask/Don't Tell" panel at Oklahoma State University.
"Don't Ask/Don't Tell Panel" at Oklahoma State University!
Posted by: cowboyneok | Jan 29, 2007 1:09:49 PM
She's either a moron, has a stupid lawyer, or she is just trying to get attention for herself. Her book was indeed published in March 2005. The movie version of Brokeback (very closely based on the 1997 short story), was scripted and in production long before March 2005 (it was actually filmed in the summer of 2004). If anything, Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana should be suing this woman for plagarism.
Posted by: Rob | Jan 29, 2007 1:10:01 PM
I agree with Wayne - if you've read the short story, you know that the movie is an absolutely verbatim adaptation from it, with *minor* additions by the screenwriters. Yikes. Looks like she may be facing a lawsuit if she's cataloged that many similarities.
Posted by: Raybob | Jan 29, 2007 1:10:30 PM
Yeah, Ang Lee had full use of Proulx's lyrically gorgeous prose suffused with the ache and ecstasy of unrealized love between two men, but he decided to go another way and lifted scenes from a cheesy blaxploitation potboiler. Uh, huh.
Posted by: Christopher | Jan 29, 2007 1:10:42 PM
Oh, my web site with announcement is:
Pink Panther's Blog
http://www.pinkpanthersblog.com/
Posted by: cowboyneok | Jan 29, 2007 1:18:36 PM
Mike,
Wow. You sure are original. What a stupid jerk you are.
james
Posted by: James | Jan 29, 2007 1:19:17 PM
Whoa, nellies!
Before you all jump to conclusions, re-read Annie's book and tell me where you find a kitchen scene and a bar scene like the one in the movie.
And as for Mike's comment- theres room at rehab next to Isaih Washington with your name on it.
Posted by: DC8 Stretch | Jan 29, 2007 1:20:24 PM
Mike is welcome to "asshole bigot troll" for $400, however.
This lady doesn't have a chance in hell.
Posted by: Marco | Jan 29, 2007 1:20:58 PM
Rob is right; the script was written almost as soon as the short story was published in 1997, and immediately gained recognition as one of Hollywood's best un-produced scripts (a 1999 article from Movieline magazine cited it as such); and the script finally went before the cameras in June 2004--a full 9 months BEFORE this lady's book was published!
Posted by: Joseph | Jan 29, 2007 1:27:35 PM
Andy, could you PLEASE post some POSITIVE stories concerning African-Americans? They do exist, ya know!
And this story is so ridiculous, you could have let it fall under the radar. Now if she WON the lawsuit, THAT would be news! But shit like this just brings out the ignorant racists who troll this site to start fires.
Posted by: soulbrotha | Jan 29, 2007 1:30:38 PM
This is from the published (1997) version of the New Yorker: (good luck with the lawsuit)
After the pie Alma got him off in the kitchen, scraped the plates and said she worried about him and he ought to get married again. He saw she was pregnant, about four, five months, he guessed.
“Once burned,” he said, leaning against the counter, feeling too big for the room.
“You still go fishin with that Jack Twist?”
“Some.” He thought she’d take the pattern off the plate with the scraping.
“You know,” she said, and from her tone he knew something was coming, “I used to wonder how come you never brought any trouts home. Always said you caught plenty. So one time I got your creel case open the night before you went on one a your little trips—price tag still on it after five years—and I tied a note on the end of the line. It said, ‘Hello, Ennis, bring some fish home, love, Alma.’ And then you come back and said you’d caught a bunch a browns and ate them up. Remember? I looked in the case when I got a chance and there was my note still tied there and that line hadn’t touched water in its life.” As though the word “water” had called out its domestic cousin, she twisted the faucet, sluiced the plates.
“That don’t mean nothin.”
“Don’t lie, don’t try to fool me, Ennis. I know what it means. Jack Twist? Jack Nasty. You and him—”
Posted by: bryan | Jan 29, 2007 1:31:57 PM
this bitch is high!!!
Posted by: JR | Jan 29, 2007 1:34:27 PM
Man, she's fucking nuts, but I love the title of her book LOL
Posted by: Becks07 | Jan 29, 2007 1:47:49 PM
"hmmm, let's see. How can I make some money off the work of someone else? I know! I'll claim Brokeback Mountain, one of the most popular gay books in modern times, has been plagiarized from the book I wrote almost ten years later."
Idiot. Is there NO integrity anymore?
Posted by: jake0526 | Jan 29, 2007 1:47:59 PM
Thank you Bryan. I knew for a fact the kitchen scene was taken almost word for word from Proulx's story, so when someone "challenged" others to prove there was a kitchen scene, I knew that person had obviously not read the original.
Posted by: mark m | Jan 29, 2007 1:50:47 PM
What's with the photography on the cover of this bitch's book? Is it supposed to be a man in a negligee? Is she (or the publishing company) trying to imply that being gay is about dressing up in women's underwear? (Maybe we should all enter into a class action lawsuit claiming that she has slandered gay men everywhere!)
Posted by: peterparker | Jan 29, 2007 2:03:22 PM
Further, the scene above is followed by Ennis goinf onto the Black and Blue Eagle bar, getting drunk and having a fight. The "author" Janice Scott-Blanton is merely grasping at straws, hoping Universal will settle to avoid a full-blown lawsuit and if she gets some free publicity, all the better.
Posted by: bryan | Jan 29, 2007 2:03:53 PM
Not to support the author's case, but there are scenes in the movie that don't appear in the short story and other scenes that are expanded with dialogue.
It would be easy for any woman whose husband led a double life to find aspects of her story in the film, which is what makes it great and this case probably b.s.
Posted by: Barrett | Jan 29, 2007 2:05:47 PM
Yay!
Broke is back on Towleroad!
We missed you!
Posted by: Marc | Jan 29, 2007 2:35:20 PM
Wow. Gay man can be really annoyingly racist and misogynist.
Posted by: ish | Jan 29, 2007 2:54:21 PM
Sometimes I think you all suck.
Posted by: FanGirlHater | Jan 29, 2007 3:15:12 PM