Court finds shared ground between the two ER dramas
A federal appeals court has decided that The Pitt bears enough resemblance to ER for Sherri Crichton, widow of the late author and screenwriter Michael Crichton, to continue her long-running suit over the medical drama. In a unanimous opinion issued on Wednesday, a three-judge panel turned down an appeal from Warner Bros Television, which had spent two years arguing that the two series share no meaningful connection.[S1][S2][S3][S4][S5]
The panel pointed to what it called clear and numerous parallels. Both programs unfold in an emergency room, deploy medical terminology the court described as frequently incomprehensible, and pile overlapping crises atop graphic images of injuries. The judges also noted exhausted doctors and nurses, emotional flare-ups, and in each show a young physician newly out of medical school who is incompetent.[S1]
The defendants had contended that such ingredients are generic similarities found in any dramatic story about emergency room doctors, and that it cannot be that every show set in an emergency room derives from ER. The court was not persuaded, concluding that the details presented were sufficient for a prima facie case. The dispute now heads to a jury trial in Los Angeles unless a settlement is reached.[S1]
Contract clause at the heart of the dispute
Michael Crichton created ER, which grew out of a film script drawn from his time as a medical student. His 1994 agreement with WBTV contained a frozen rights provision that barred spin-offs or reboots of his work without his consent. Crichton died in 2008. Sherri Crichton brought her suit in August 2024, five months before The Pitt's first episode aired, alleging that the new series amounted to an unauthorized ER reboot and accusing Wells of personal betrayal.[S1]
The appellate panel ruled that WBTV has to go to trial, yet it dismissed Wyle, Wells and Gemmill from the case, concluding there was no proof any of them understood that making The Pitt might violate Crichton's contract rights. WBTV had previously tried to get the suit dismissed through California's anti-Slapp law, which aims to discourage baseless claims that suppress free expression. In 2025 Judge Wendy Chang denied that request, finding Sherri Crichton had sufficient evidence to proceed.[S1]
Producers say the show grew from a different plan
In interviews, Wyle, Wells and Gemmill have explained that The Pitt emerged after plans for an ER revival stalled, though the real catalyst was that they had already been working together on a pandemic-era medical drama about the lives of healthcare staff. On Amy Poehler's Good Hang podcast, Wyle said the team had convened to develop that project with HBO Max, and that when the revival fell through, the opening let them speed up work on The Pitt.[S1]
Wyle said being free of the ER reboot was liberating, describing how detaching from that intellectual property opened up the storytelling. Rather than revisiting familiar characters and asking what they had been doing, the team could focus on the issues of the day and the most cogent way to present them, which he said allowed them to reframe and modernize the material without paying homage to a well-trodden path.[S1]
Sherri Crichton said she was deeply gratified by the appellate decision and looked forward to discovery and to presenting her case, which she said affects writers, creators and their families and estates, before a jury. The Guardian said it had contacted WBTV for comment. Over two seasons The Pitt has collected 12 Emmys, two Golden Globes and a Peabody, with Wyle earning multiple best actor honors as Dr Michael Robby Robinavitch, a veteran chief attending physician in a Pittsburgh emergency department. Wyle previously played Dr John Carter across 11 seasons of ER, a wealthy young doctor in an underfunded Chicago emergency room. The third season of The Pitt is scheduled to begin airing in January.[S1]
