"Bones" Stars Emily Deschanel and David Boreanaz have filed a lawsuit against Fox, claiming they were cheated out of tens of millions in profits.

The cast members, along with executive producer Kathy Reichs, filed the lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The plaintiffs are accusing 20th Century Fox Television of being "engaged in a systematic and pervasive effort to cheat" them out of assets they earned from starring on "Bones," which is the network's longest-running drama.

A spokesman for Fox did not offer up a response to this claim.

As the series became more popular and earned more profits, the lawsuit claims accounting statements issued by the studio "counter-intuitively shows plaintiffs falling farther and farther away from achieving profits."

The Fox series, based on forensic anthropologist Reichs' novels, promised to give her a 5 percent of the profits in exchange for her rights and production services. Actors Deschanel and Boreanaz were guaranteed 3 percent of the profits.

After receiving statements in 2010, which show Reichs was $90 million away from receiving her profit payments, and Deschanel and Boreanaz were $100 million away from their profits, all three plaintiffs filed for an audit of the studio's books. This occurred directly after the series fifth season finale.

The lawsuit claims when FOX was going through negotiations with them for the fifth and sixth seasons of the series, "it did so under the threat of canceling the series unless plaintiffs accepted its nonnegotiable license fee figure, and then concealed information about the true value of that figure."

John Berlinski, Mansi Shah and Candace Frazier at Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman are representing the plaintiffs in this case.

"Bones," which also stars Michaela Conlin, Eric Millegan, T.J. Thyne, Jonathan Adams, Tamara Taylor, John Francis Dailey and John Boyd, first aired in September 2005.

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