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The Holdovers is accused of being 'plagiarized line-by-line' by screenwriter Simon Stephenson - as it loses Best Original Screenplay nomination to Anatomy of a Fall at 2024 Oscars
Screenwriter Simon Stephenson has accused the creative team behind the feted Academy Award nominee The Holdovers of plagiarizing a 2013 script he wrote for an unmade film titled Frisco.
The Holdovers, a dramatic comedy, was directed by Alexander Payne and written by David Hemingson, with Paul Giamatti, Da'Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa leading the cast.
The movie was nominated for five Oscars Sunday, including Best Motion Picture of the Year, and Best Original Screenplay for Hemingson, who lost to Anatomy of a Fall writers Justine Triet and Arthur Harari.
Stephenson aired his grievances in a January 12 email to Writer's Guild of America director of credits Lesley Mackey that Variety obtained and published on Saturday.
'I’ve encountered a credits-related issue on quite a high profile WGA-covered project,' said Stephenson, who has also penned notable motion pictures such as Luca and Paddington 2.
Screenwriter Simon Stephenson has accused the creative team behind the feted Academy Award nominee The Holdovers of plagiarizing a 2013 script he wrote for an unmade film titled Frisco
The Holdovers features (L-R) Dominic Sessa, Paul Giamatti and Da'Vine Joy Randolph
He continued: 'The evidence the holdovers screenplay has been plagiarized line-by-line from Frisco is genuinely overwhelming - anybody who looks at even the briefest sample pretty much invariably uses the word "brazen."'
Stephenson said in the email he felt Payne read the screenplay for Frisco in 2013, when it was featured prominently on the industry's Black List, which is a collection of the top-rated unproduced scripts.
Frisco was described by Variety as 'a drama centered on a world-weary middle-aged children’s doctor and the 15-year-old patient he gets stuck looking after,' which used the same exact verbiage to describe The Holdovers.
In The Holdovers, Giamatti portrayed teacher Paul Hunham, while Sessa played the teen, Angus Tully, opposite Randolph, who won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance as school's cafeteria manager Mary Lamb.
Stephenson said he came to the conclusion his work had been plagiarized after studying both films in terms of scenes, dialogue and sequences.
Stephenson said that he had email evidence indicating Payne saw the Frisco script initially when it came out in 2013, and again six years later in 2019, prior to recruiting Hemingson to write the film, and serve as a producer.
Stephenson subsequently contacted the WGA board again in February 25, telling the organization he had airtight evidence his work had been copied for The Holdovers.
'I can demonstrate beyond any possible doubt that the meaningful entirety of the screenplay for a film with WGA-sanctioned credits that is currently on track to win a screenwriting Oscar has been plagiarized line-by-line from a popular unproduced screenplay of mine,' he said. 'I can also show that the director of the offending film was sent and read my screenplay on two separate occasions prior to the offending film entering development.'
Oscars 2024 winners: AT A GLANCE
Best Picture: Oppenheimer
Best Actress: Emma Stone - Poor Things
Best Actor: Cillian Murphy - Oppenheimer
Best Director: Christopher Nolan - Oppenheimer
Supporting Actress: Da'Vine Joy Randolph - The Holdovers
Supporting Actor: Robert Downey Jr. - Oppenheimer
Original Song: Billie Eilish and Finneas O'Connell - What Was I Made For? from Barbie
Seen left to right: Actor In A Supporting Role - Robert Downey Jr. (Oppenheimer), Actress In A Supporting Role - Da'Vine Joy Randolph (The Holdovers ), Actress In A Leading Role - Emma Stone (Poor Things), and Actor In A Leading Role - Cillian Murphy (Oppenheimer)
Original Score - Ludwig Göransson - Oppenheimer
Cinematography: Hoyte van Hoytema - Oppenheimer
Achievement in Film Editing: Jennifer Lame - Oppenheimer
Production Design: James Price and Shona Heath; Set Decoration: Zsuzsa Mihale - Poor Things
Make-up and Hairstyling: Nadia Stacey, Mark Coulier and Josh Weston - Poor Things
Achievement in Costume Design: Holly Waddington - Poor Things
Original Screenplay: Justine Triet and Arthur Harari - Anatomy Of A Fall
Adapted Screenplay: Cord Jefferson - American Fiction
International Feature Film - The Zone of Interest from United Kingdom
The Holdovers, a dramatic comedy, was directed by Alexander Payne, pictured Sunday at the Academy Awards in LA
Hemingson lost the nomination for Best Original Screenplay to Anatomy of a Fall writers Justine Triet and Arthur Harari
Da'Vine Joy Randolph delivered an emotional speech in her win for Best Supporting Actress
He added: 'By "meaningful entirety" I do mean literally everything- story, characters, structure, scenes, dialogue, the whole thing. Some of it is just insanely brazen: many of the most important scenes are effectively unaltered and even remain visibly identical in layout on the page.'
Stephenson said that The Holdovers had five scenes that were not initially derived from Frisco, including a sequence involving a person getting away with plagiarism.
Stephenson said he was informed by an associate counsel with the WGA that the issue was not under the purview of the guild, and advised him 'a lawsuit remains the most viable option under these circumstances.'
Payne has past won a pair of Oscars for Best Adapted Screenplay, for 2005's Sideways and 2012's The Descendants.
Oscar winners 2024 full list - see who received trophies for this year's Academy Awards
Best Picture
American Fiction
Anatomy of a Fall
Barbie
The Holdovers
Killers of the Flower Moon
Maestro
Oppenheimer - WINNER
Past Lives
Poor Things
The Zone of Interest
Oppenheimer was the biggest winner of the night with seven including top honor Best Picture; Emma Thomas, Christopher Nolan, and Charles Roven are seen
Best Director
Justine Triet, Anatomy of a Fall
Martin Scorsese, Killers of the Flower Moon
Christopher Nolan, Oppenheimer - WINNER
Yorgos Lanthimos, Poor Things
Jonathan Glazer, The Zone of Interest
Actress in a Leading Role
Annette Bening, Nyad
Lily Gladstone, Killers of the Flower Moon
Sandra Huller, Anatomy of a Fall
Carey Mulligan, Maestro
Emma Stone, Poor Things - WINNER
Emma Stone earned a shock win in the Actress in a Leading Role category for Poor Things
Actor in a Leading Role
Bradley Cooper, Maestro
Colman Domingo, Rustin
Paul Giamatti, The Holdovers
Cillian Murphy, Oppenheimer - WINNER
Jeffrey Wright, American Fiction
Actress in a Supporting Role
Emily Blunt, Oppenheimer
Danielle Brooks, The Color Purple
America Ferrera, Barbie
Jodie Foster, Nyad
Da’Vine Joy Randolph, The Holdovers - WINER
Da’Vine Joy Randolph triumphed in the Actress in a Supporting Role category for The Holdovers
Actor in a Supporting Role
Sterling K. Brown, American Fiction
Robert De Niro, Killers of the Flower Moon
Robert Downey Jr., Oppenheimer - WINNER
Ryan Gosling, Barbie
Mark Ruffalo, Poor Things
Animated Feature Film
The Boy and the Heron - WINNER
Elemental
Nimona
Robot Dreams
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
Cinematography
El Conde
Killers of the Flower Moon
Maestro
Oppenheimer, Hoyte van Hoytema - WINNER
Poor Things
Original Screenplay
Anatomy of a Fall, Justine Triet and Arthur Harari - WINNER
The Holdovers, David Hemingson
Maestro, Bradley Cooper and Josh Singer
May December, Samy Burch (Story b Samy Burch & Alex Mechanik)
Past Lives, Celine Song
Adapted Screenplay
American Fiction, Cord Jefferson - WINNER
Barbie, Greta Gerwig & Noah Baumbach
Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan
Poor Things, Tony McNamara
The Zone of Interest, Jonathan Glazer
Cord Jefferson won Adapted Screenplay for American Fiction
Achievement in Production Design
Barbie
Killers of the Flower Moon
Napoleon
Oppenheimer
Poor Things, Production Design: James Price and Shona Heath; Set Decoration: Zsuzsa Mihalek - WINNER
Achievement in Sound
The Creator
Maestro
Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One
Oppenheimer
The Zone of Interest, Tarn Willers and Johnnie Burn - WINNER
Original Song
'The Fire Inside' from Flamin' Hot
'I'm Just Ken' from Barbie
'It Never Went Away' from American Symphony
'Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People)' from Killers of the Flower Moon
'What Was I Made For?' from Barbie, Billie Eilish and Finneas O'Connell - WINNERS
Billie Eilish and Finneas O'Connell earned Original Song for Barbie's What Was I Made For?
Original Score
American Fiction
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny
Killers of the Flower Moon
Oppenheimer, Ludwig Göransson - WINNER
Poor Things
Live Action Short Film
The After
Invincible
Knight of Fortune
Red, White and Blue
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar, Wes Anderson and Steven Rales - WINNER
Animated Short Film
Letter to a Pig
95 Senses
Our Uniform
Pachyderme
WAR IS OVER! Inspired by the Music of John and Yoko - WINNER
WAR IS OVER! Inspired by the Music of John and Yoko won Animated Short Film; Dave Mullins and Brad Booker pictured
Documentary Feature Film
Bobi Wine: The People's President
The Eternal Memory
Four Daughters
To Kill a Tiger
20 Days in Mariupol - WINNER
Documentary Short Film
The ABCs of Book Banning
The Barber of Little Rock
Island in Between
The Last Repair Shop - WINNER
Nǎi Nai and Wài Pó
International Feature Film
Io Capitano, Italy
Perfect Days, Japan
Society of the Snow, Spain
The Teachers' Lounge, Germany
The Zone of Interest, United Kingdom - WINNER
The Zone Of Interest took home two Oscars including International Feature Film; Jonathan Glazer and James Wilson are pictured
Makeup and Hairstyling
Golda
Maestro
Oppenheimer
Poor Things, Nadia Stacey, Mark Coulier and Josh Weston - WINNER
Society of the Snow
Achievement in Costume Design
Barbie
Killers of the Flower Moon
Napoleon
Oppenheimer
Poor Things, Holly Waddington - WINNER
Achievement in Film Editing
Anatomy of a Fall
The Holdovers
Killers of the Flower Moon
Oppenheimer, Jennifer Lame - WINNER
Poor Things
Visual Effects
The Creator
Godzilla Minus One, Takashi Yamazaki, Kiyoko Shibuya, Masaki Takahashi and Tatsuji Nojima - WINNER
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One
Napoleon
Godzilla Minus One won the Visual Effects award as Masaki Takahashi, Takashi Yamazaki, Kiyoko Shibuya and Tatsuji Nojima are pictured