Texas Writer Claims Hollywood Thriller Based on Her Original Script



May 13, 2005 -- A freelance screenwriter and college history teacher has filed suit against the producers of the 2001 science fiction thriller "Replicant," claiming she wrote a script with the same title and similar plot elements several years earlier.

Sara "Sally" Stratso of Pilot Point, Texas, says she wrote her script in 1994 and 1995, and copyrighted it before entering it in the 1997 Lone Star Screenplay Competition. At the competition, one of the judges thought the script's title character seemed a good fit for actor Jean-Claude Van Damme.

In 2001, Van Damme starred in the big-screen version, which is the basis for the lawsuit.

"That script belongs to me," Ms. Stratso says. "I thought of it, I agonized over it and I copyrighted it to protect it. No one should be able to just take it away."

In the Hollywood version, Van Damme plays a serial killer. Frustrated at their inability to catch him, police use the killer's own DNA samples to build a clone and track him down.

"The movie and Sally's script aren't identical twins, but they're at least fraternal," says Ms. Stratso's attorney, Dan Boyd of the Boyd Law Firm, PC, in Dallas. "There are so many similarities that it's just hard to believe they didn't have Sally's script on hand when they shot this movie."

The lawsuit, Stratso v. Artisan Entertainment Inc. et al, cites 42 ways the movie "Replicant" and Ms. Stratso's script are similar. Among the most basic is the name itself. In English, use of the word replicant to signify a duplicate doesn't exist, though somehow it became the name of the movie several years after Ms. Stratso used it as the title of her script.

In addition to the film's producers, the lawsuit also names NBC Universal, owners of the USA Network, which continues to air the movie on cable. The lawsuit also targets companies that continue to profit from sales and rentals of "Replicant" DVDs and videotapes, including Blockbuster, Amazon.com and Netflix.

The Boyd Law Firm, PC, provides legal services to individuals and businesses. Dan Boyd is board certified in both civil trial law and civil appellate law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization.

For more information, please contact Mark Annick at 800-559-4534, pager 214-967-2299 or e-mail protected from spam bots.





Texas Writer Claims Hollywood Thriller Based on Her Original Script