Dave Franco and Alison Brie, who are married in real life, star in Michael Shanks's film 'Together.' (Neon)Filmmaker Michael Shanks's debut feature Together is one of the most anticipated horror films of the summer - but it's not without controversy. The Sundance Film Festival darling - it sold for a reported $17 million to distributor Neon following a bidding war - stars real-life husband and wife Dave Franco and Alison Brie as a married couple whose vacation takes a turn when (spoiler alert!) a supernatural force causes their bodies to merge. It's a funny, albeit terrifying premise - and one that another production company alleges was stolen from its film, Better Half.
Shanks, as well as the talent agency behind the Together team, deny the allegations. But that hasn't stopped people from talking about whether Together is really a rip-off. With Together heading to theaters on July 30, here's an explainer of the drama.
What is the Better Half team alleging?Back in May, producers of the indie movie Better Half, Jess Jacklin and Charles Beale, filed a lawsuit against the producers of Together, alleging copyright infringement. (Better Half was written and directed by Patrick Henry Phelan, however, Jacklin and Beale's production company, StudioFest, is the only plaintiff named in the suit.)AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAccording to an article in Entertainment Weekly, Jacklin and Beale claim that the makers of Together stole the concept of Better Half, in which a couple "wake up to find their bodies physically fused together as a metaphor for codependency."While the main characters in Together are married and in Better Half they are strangers who just had a one night stand, both films show how the couple at the center "navigate daily life as their physical attachment progresses and they start to control each other's body parts," per the lawsuit. The suit also notes that both couples attempt to use chainsaws to separate themselves from one another.
The Better Half producers also note a number of other details that the movies share, including a reference to the Spice Girls, the professions of the main characters and bathroom scenes in which both couples attempt to hide their intertwined condition from a third party. According to the suit, the films also include references to Plato's Symposium, which dissects the meaning and significance of love.
The Better Half team also claims that Franco's and Brie's agents at WME were sent a copy of the script for Better Half in 2020, but they ultimately passed on the project. It's worth noting that while Together is described as a horror movie, Better Half is billed as a romantic comedy.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThe Brooklyn Film Festival, where Better Half premiered in 2022, features following description for the film on its website:"According to Greek mythology, humans were once two-faced, four-armed, four-legged creatures, until Zeus split us in two, leaving us in an endless search for our other halves. Fast forward to modern day: Arturo, a hopeless romantic in search of true love, and Daphne, a serial polygamist allergic to commitment, meet for what should be a one-night stand, and quite literally find their other half when their bodies fuse during sex. The haphazard journey to come undone might just reveal what they'd been missing all along."Better Half appears not to have received distribution after its festival run and is unable to be viewed online at this point in time.
What the Together team has saidWME, the talent agency representing Franco, Brie and filmmaker Shanks, has vehemently denied the Better Half allegations. Speaking to IndieWire, a spokesperson for WME stated, "This lawsuit is frivolous and without merit. The facts in this case are clear and we plan to vigorously defend ourselves."AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementIn a joint statement on June 18, Neon and WME alleged that the plaintiffs are doing "nothing more than drumming up 15 minutes of fame for a failed project, demonstrated by the fact they contacted the press before filing their lawsuit, and did so without doing the most basic due diligence." They accused Jacklin and Beale of searching for a payday by making waves in the press."We look forward to presenting our case in court," they said.
That same day, Shanks, who wrote and directed Together, shared his own statement on Neon's Instagram and X accounts, calling the accusations "devastating." He said Together came from a "deeply personal" place as, like Franco's and Brie's characters, Shanks said he is in a long-term relationship, and that his own experience of the "entanglement of identity, love, and codependence" is what inspired Together."Tim's story, his love for Millie, his relationship to his family, his relationship to unfulfilled ambitions as a musician, is completely rooted in my own personal life," Shanks said in his statement. "I lost my father at a young age in the same way our ma