A California appeals court has allowed Sherri Crichton’s lawsuit alleging that HBO’s The Pitt is an unauthorized reboot of ER to proceed against Warner Bros. Television. The unanimous ruling, issued Nov. 4, also removed Noah Wyle and producers John Wells and R. Scott Gemmill as defendants.
The three-judge panel upheld a lower court’s refusal to dismiss the case against Warner Bros. Television, which produced both series. The decision addresses an early legal challenge; it does not determine whether The Pitt is legally derived from ER.
The appeals court said the shows share features including their focus on emergency rooms, difficult working conditions for medical staff, rapid pacing and overlapping crises. Warner Bros. Television argued that these are generic elements of medical dramas.
The judges dismissed claims against Wyle, Wells and Gemmill, finding no evidence that they knew about the contract provisions they were accused of interfering with. Wyle stars in both shows and is a producer on The Pitt; Wells created the series, and Gemmill is an executive producer.
The dispute centers on rights to ‘ER’
Sherri Crichton’s lawsuit alleges that her late husband, ER creator Michael Crichton, secured a contract provision reserving rights to sequels, remakes, spinoffs and other productions derived from the series. The suit says Warner Bros. moved ahead with The Pitt after negotiations over a proposed ER reboot failed.
Warner Bros. Television said it maintains that The Pitt is an original series and that the claims lack merit. The company said it would defend its position as the case proceeds.
Crichton wrote the pilot for ER, which aired from 1994 to 2009. The lawsuit was filed before The Pitt had aired. The court’s ruling leaves the claims against Warner Bros. Television to continue, without deciding their merits.
Read the California Court of Appeal opinion. CBS News also reported on the ruling.
Nicole French 
Reid Bentley