The author of the non-fiction book The Blind Side, which served as the basis of the hit 2009 movie, has weighed in on former NFL athlete Michael Oher’s lawsuit against the Tuohy family, alleging Oher turned down royalty checks from the movie deal.
In an interview with The Washington Post, author Michael Lewis denied Oher’s accusation that the Tuohys made millions off of the film while leaving Oher in the lurch.
He also slammed Hollywood studios for accounting practices that frequently short change the people whose real-life stories are used to make their movies.
“Everybody should be mad at the Hollywood studio system,” Lewis said. “Michael Oher should join the writers strike. It’s outrageous how Hollywood accounting works, but the money is not in the Tuohys’ pockets.”
Quinton Aaron and Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side. Warner Bros Pictures
Lewis said the Tuohys planned to share royalties from the movie among the family members, including Oher, but Oher began declining his royalty checks. Lewis said he believed the Tuohy family had deposited Oher’s share in a trust fund for Oher’s son.
The author claimed that after taxes and agent fees, he and the Tuohy family made about $350,000 each from The Blind Side movie — sums that apparently include rights and royalties.
As Breitbart News reported, Oher filed a shocking lawsuit alleging that the Tuohys cut him out of profits from the Oscar-winning movie and never actually adopted him, claiming the couple tricked him into a conservatorship.
The Tuohys responded by alleging Oher tried to shake them down to the tune of $15 million prior to filing the suit.
The Tuohy family’s attorney Martin Singer alleged Oher threatened the family, “saying that he would plant a negative story about them in the press unless they paid him $15 million.”
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