Mo’Nique sued Paramount and CBS on Wednesday, in search of what the Oscar-winning actor and comic says are unpaid royalties from her sitcom “The Parkers.”
The breach-of-contract lawsuit submitted in Los Angeles Remarkable Court and acquired by The Associated Push alleges the defendants artificially frustrated the show’s profitability to “retain tens of millions that would in any other case be contractually owing” to Mo’Nique’s generation enterprise.
“While the Sequence has established to be a main fiscal results for its producers and distributors, the series’ talent have not been permitted to share in the fruits of that success,” the accommodate claims.
The suit was submitted by Hicks Media, the output organization Mo’Nique owns with her partner and organization partner, Sidney Hicks. It names as defendants CBS Studios, Paramount Shots and the show’s production enterprise Big Ticket Productions. It seeks financial damages to be decided at demo.
E-mail seeking remark were being despatched to reps of the defendants.
The accommodate states the series’ creators and writers have been in the same way underpaid, and that Mo’Nique discovered of the alleged breach of agreement when they recently filed a comparable lawsuit.
“I just want the contractual compensation that I have gained,” Mo’Nique claimed in a assertion.
“The Parkers,” a spinoff of the sitcom “Moesha,” ran for five seasons and 110 episodes on the now-defunct community UPN, a forerunner of The CW, from 1999 to 2004. Mo’Nique starred as Nikki Parker, a mother who returns to the exact faculty her daughter is attending.
The exhibit has been rerun in syndication in a variety of forms since, and has been offered for streaming on Netflix because 2020.
In a previous lawsuit, Mo’Nique sued Netflix for race and sex discrimination in its offer you for a proposed comedy exclusive, accusing the streaming service of providing her a lowball present that was part of a greater corporation tendency to underpay black gals. The match was settled last 12 months.
“Mo’Nique is not shy about taking on these David vs. Goliath battles in Hollywood to challenge these questionable practices that are endemic to the industry,” David deRubertis, one particular of her lawyers in equally lawsuits, mentioned in a assertion.
The 55-calendar year-outdated actor, whose lawful name is Monique Angela Hicks, very first gained fame as a stand-up comic and was among the “Queens of Comedy” showcased in the 2000 movie of the similar name. She gained an Academy Award for ideal supporting actress for her functionality in the 2009 film “Precious.”
