Lawsuits over stolen ideas and properties are commonplace in the entertainment business–but the claims generally come from those working within the industry.
This time around, it’s a janitor.
Variety reports Tally Collier, a Chicago, Ill., janitor, is suing Eddie Murphy and producers of the now-defunct animated series The PJs, claiming they stole his likeness from an amateur documentary. Imagine Entertainment execs Ron Howard, Brian Grazer and Tony Krantz are also named in the suit.
The short documentary, made by Daryl Murphy (no relation to Eddie), centers on life in Chicago’s housing projects and stars Collier. The filmmaker submitted the video to The Oprah Winfrey Show in 1998 in hopes of getting a spot on a future segment but was never contacted. Collier believes Eddie Murphy and the others somehow got the tape from the show.
The PJs, which ran on Fox in 1999 and on the WB during the 2000-01 season, was an amusing look at a family living in a housing project. Executive producer Eddie Murphy was the voice of the central character–building superintendent Thurgoode Orenthal Stubbs.
The suit claims one of The PJs characters, Sanchez, is an exact copy of Collier; both men use an electronic voice box to speak and a cane to walk. It also cites other similar characters in both the amateur video and the animated series.
It’s not been proven how The PJs producers could have gotten the tape since none of them are associated with Oprah.
The suit was filed March 22 in U.S. District Court in Illinois. The plaintiff is asking more than $75,000 in actual damages and more than $10 million in punitive damages, Variety reports.
