HBO 'True Detective' Show Accused of Plagiarism: Author Claims Pizzolatto Stole Matthew McConaughey's Rust Cohle Character from Season 1
It's barely two weeks until the Emmy Awards, and HBO's "True Detective," which has already won so many awards, is again expected to win at least one or two more from the award-giving body. However, there have been rumors floating around recently that accuse Nic Pizzolatto, the show's creator, of plagiarizing the work of others.
According to Hollywood Reporter, a blog from a website run by Jon Padgett, which is dedicated to Thomas Ligotti, an author, claimed that Pizzolatto got a huge chunk of the language and intellectual content from Thomas Ligotti's non-fiction book, "The Conspiracy Against the Human Race," and used them for the scripts of "True Detective."
Padgett listed several examples, most of which were lines spoken by Matthew McConaughey's character, Rust Cohle, from the hit TV series. He said he had compared them to the book written by Ligotti as evidence to support his claim. He added that Ligotti was not accorded enough credit even if Nic Pizzolatto had talked about being a fan of the work of Ligotti and how it had influenced the TV series.
The rumors quickly gathered steam, and people started to argue among themselves whether the rumors were true. Because of this, both HBO and Nic Pizzolatto had to make statements yesterday, Aug. 7, to deny the accusations.
The Washington Post reported that in Nic Pizzolatto's released statement, he denied that anything in the show "True Detective" had been plagiarized. He said that the pessimistic philosophical thoughts expressed by the character Rust Cohle are not unique to any one author but rather ideas that were in the minds and works of many philosophers, such as E.M. Cioran, Friedrich Nietzsche, Arthur Schopenhauer and many others.
HBO also released their own statement, saying that "True Detective" is exceptionally original and that its story, plot, dialogue and characters are from Nic Pizzolatto. The company added that philosophical concepts are not owned by a single person and are free to be used by anyone, including those who write fiction, as evidenced by several works in the past. One of the show's strengths is its capability to explore and engage with themes and ideas that novelists and philosophers have thought of and debated over time. HBO said that they are standing by Nic Pizzolatto, its writing and the show.
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