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Lee Daniels Wins Copycat ‘Empire’ Lawsuit

By Niki Cruz
Published on: 04:53 PST, Mar 31, 2016

Lee Daniels has won in a case that accused the Empire co-creator of copying a main plot point. According to TMZ, a man who goes by the name of Jon Astor-White accused the co-creator and producer of stealing his “King Solomon” character for Empire’s Lucious Lyon origin story.

In the suit, Astor-White alleged that there were similarities between Lucious Lyon and King Solomon. King Solomon is about “a Harvard-educated black guy who starts a record label.” For those who don’t watch Empire, Lucious is a rags-to-riches background who started as a drug dealing rapper and built his own empire via his record label, hence the show’s title.

So how did Lee Daniels know about King Solomon to rip it off? According to the writer of King Solomon, he had shopped the idea around in Hollywood. That said, the judge ruled in Lee Daniels’ favor due to Daniels lack of contact with the original content. In other words, there was no way for Daniels to receive the script King Solomon, so he wasn’t influenced by the plot or character, despite the similarities.

While there are similarities, TMZ points out that King Solomon doesn’t have a Cookie as his backbone and the character wasn’t “terminally ill.”

The biggest stretch on Astor-White’s part is when he stated that King Solomon’s daughter is similar to Lucious’ son Jamal because they’re both feminine. For the record, Jamal is an openly gay character. The judge slammed this assertion and called it an “outdated and offensive stereotype.”

Of course, this isn’t the first time the Empire co-creator has been accused of stealing an original story for Empire, so Lee Daniels must be used to this happening by now.

Back in August, a woman by the name of Sophia Eggleston claimed that Empire stole her life story when they created the character of Cookie Lyon. She had filed a $300 million lawsuit against Daniels and Fox.

Eggleston stated that she was a “drug kingpin” who spent her time in jail for manslaughter after placing a hit on a man. Eggleston claimed that Daniels and Fox got a hold of her memoir, The Hidden Hand, after she traveled around L.A. in 2011 to meet with screenwriter Rita Miller. Miller allegedly has a copy of her book, and Eggleston insists that the screenwriter told her she wanted to pitch her story to Lee Daniels specifically.

The court documents stated, “Cookie was a drug kingpin that went to jail. So did plaintiff Eggleston. Cookie is released from jail confinement and immediately places a hit on a certain individual. Plaintiff… actually was jailed for doing the actual hit on a man.”

Co-creator Danny Strong maintains the story that he had pitched the idea after he heard Sean Combs’ rags-to-riches tale and pitched the idea as a “hip hop King Lear.”
Strong has also stated that the story of Lucious Lyon is loosely based on Jay-Z, who went from selling drugs to owning his own successful label and enterprise.

At the time, he told Sway from Sway in The Morning, “The Jay-Z story, which very much inspired Lucious Lyon, certain elements of Lucious Lyon, was that story. For me the story of people who have some sort of criminal past, or gangster past are not limited to black culture.”

Even though one case was thrown out, Lee Daniels still has his fair share of lawsuits rolling in. In September, actor Sean Penn filed a $10 million lawsuit against Lee Daniels citing character defamation after Daniels insinuated that Penn had been in a violent relationship with his ex Madonna.

What do you think about the constant speculation about Empire’s origins?

[Photo by FOX]

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