Fans divided over The Holdovers plagiarism accusations
After the plagiarism accusation became public, reactions on social media quickly came in, with divided opinions on whether the screenplays can actually be deemed as similar.
According toVariety, Simon Stephenson wrote an email to the WGA board, saying: “I can demonstrate beyond any possible doubt that the meaningful entirety of the screenplay for a film with WGA-sanctioned credits that is currently on track to win a screenwriting Oscar has been plagiarized line-by-line from a popular unproduced screenplay of mine.”
A full breakdown of the similarities was also released, where scenes were placed together and story beats were compared.
The news has since circulated the internet, with many seemingly believing the accusation.
“This is terrible news for someone who is both obsessed with The Holdovers and Paddington 2,”one X userwrote.
“I’m inclined to believe the side that brought us Paddington 2,” saidanother.
“Aw man that sucks, while I absolutely loved The Holdovers it’s a shame to see plagiarism on this kind of scale,”another added.
if you were the writer of THE HOLDOVERS you would have written THE HOLDOVERSpic.twitter.com/vJqoEWzOP5
Another added: “Am I the only one who finds this extremely superficial & basic? Because I can think of hundreds of other films where characters smoke or are called to talk with their boss. Now, I really want The Holdovers to win. This plagiarism accusation is nothing.”
“Lol read through the examples and it’s the most broad strokes stuff,” saidone comment.
With The Holdovers nominated across the board for tonight’s 96th Academy Awards ceremony (and with voting already locked-in), it’ll be a tense moment when the award for Best Original Screenplay is handed out.
Jessica Cullen is a TV and Movies Writer on Dexerto’s UK team. She’s previously written for The Digital Fix, Cosmopolitan, Refinery29, Slate and more. Aside from being the residential Yellowstone expert, she also loves Westerns, ’90s action movies, and true crime. You can email her here: jessica.cullen@dexerto.com.
