Who came up with the idea for the Oscar-nominated film The Full Monty? Two New Zealand playwrights, Andrew McCarten and Stephen Sinclair, are claiming that the producers of the sleeper hit film plagiarized their 1987 play, Ladies Night, and on Mar. 2 they filed a lawsuit in U.S.federal court, according to an Associated Press report. Don Engle, the playwrights' attorney, told AP that the suit was prepared as soon as his clients became aware of the film. Ladies Night was a hit play in New Zealand and was also produced in several theatres in Great Britain.

The suit seeks all of 20th Century Fox's profits from the film. The Full Monty has to date grossed more than $200 million.

This type of lawsuit is becoming a common occurence in the film world. In late-1997, writer Barbara Chase-Riboud brought a suit against Steven Spielberg and the other producers of Amistad, claiming that they had plagiarized a book she had written. The producers subsequently claimed that Chase-Riboud had herself plagiarized another writers's book, and ultimately the suit was dropped.