Harper Lee's estate sues over West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin's Broadway adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird author Harper Lee’s estate is suing the producer of a Broadway adaptation of the novel, claiming the play strays too far from the spirit of the book.

The West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin’s script for the play, which is being produced by Oscar-winner Scott Rudin, deviated too much from the content of Lee’s novel, the lawsuit claims.

It alleges the play adds two new characters, changes the character of lawyer Atticus Finch to make him initially naïve to racism, and “did not present a fair depiction of 1930s small-town Alabama” because it introduced elements of today’s social climate.

Lee died in February 2016 at the age of 89, but the lawsuit filed in an Alabama court refers to a copy of a contract signed by her about eight months before her death, in which Rudin’s theatrical production company Rudinplay agreed to pay her $100,000 (£71,775) to adapt the novel for the stage.

The lawsuit says the contract also obliged Rudinplay to remain faithful to the spirit of the book and its original characters.

Asking the southern district court of Alabama to rule that the play “violates” the contract, the lawsuit cites interviews about the play, which is due to open on Broadway in December, with Jeff Daniels as Atticus Finch.

The lawsuit quoted Sorkin telling Vulture in September 2017: “As far as Atticus and his virtue goes, this is a different take on Mockingbird than Harper Lee’s or Horton Foote’s [the screenwriter of the 1962 film starring Gregory Peck].

“He becomes Atticus Finch by the end of the play, and while he’s going along, he has a kind of running argument with Calpurnia, the housekeeper, which is a much bigger role in the play I just wrote.

“He is in denial about his neighbours, and his friends and the world around him, that it is as racist as it is … He becomes an apologist for these people.”

The lawsuit – filed by attorney Tonja B. Carter, the executor of Lee’s estate – also quotes the article as saying: “That adjustment not only gives Atticus a character journey from naïveté to righteousness, it ties the 1930s-set Mockingbird to today’s social climate.”

The lawsuit then cited another of Sorkin’s interviews, with Playbill, which reported: “When the curtain rises on the world premiere of Sorkin’s To Kill a Mockingbird, audiences won’t encounter the morally sound Atticus Finch they know.”

Playbill, the lawsuit noted, also referenced a 2016 interview where Sorkin had said it “doesn’t work at all” just to take the scenes from Lee’s novel and dramatise them.

The lawsuit says when concerns were raised in response to these interviews, Rudin, who won a best film Oscar for No Country For Old Men, emailed the Lee estate to say: “The Atticus of the book is the Atticus of the novel … I am never going to fall anywhere outside the agreement.”

Rudin also added that the script was still only in draft form and would evolve.

Six days ago, on 9 March, Rudinplay’s lawyer wrote to Ms Carter denying that the play departed in any way from the spirit of the novel. The lawyer also argued that even if the play did deviate from the spirit of the novel, the estate only had the right to discuss its concerns, not enforce them.

According to the lawsuit, Rudinplay’s lawyer wrote: “Even if the author believes that the play derogates or departs from the spirit of the novel, or alters its characters, the author’s remedy is that the author ‘will be afforded an opportunity to discuss with [Rudinplay] resolutions of any such concerns.

“The author is therefore not the final arbiter of what ‘derogates or departs from the spirit of the novel, or alters its characters.’”

And, the lawyer was said to have added, it was too late to make wholesale changes to the play, because the actors were now five weeks away from doing their second preparatory workshop.

The lawsuit quoted Rudinplay’s lawyer as informing the Harper Lee estate: “It is unreasonable to expect that extensive changes can be achieved five weeks before the second workshop. It simply is no longer possible, even if [Mr.Rudin] were in agreement with everything [you say].”

After news of the lawsuit emerged, a statement issued on behalf of Rudinplay said Sorkin’s script “is a faithful adaptation of a singular novel which has been crafted well within the constraints of the signed agreement”.

The statement also alleged a “history of litigious behaviour” by Lee’s estate, saying: “This is, unfortunately, simply another such lawsuit, the latest of many, and we believe that it is without merit.

“While we hope this gets resolved, if it does not, the suit will be vigorously defended.”