Michael Sheen is embroiled in a legal row alongside Channel 4 over their documentary Michael Sheen's Secret Million Pound Giveaway.
According to The Guardian, a team of independent TV producers have questioned the originality of Sheen's documentary with Channel 4, raising the similarities it shares with their 2021 project Bank Job.
Lawyers for independent filmmakers Daniel Edelstyn and Hilary Powell have written to Sheen and the makers of his documentary, claiming they discussed 2021's Bank Job with Sheen who later presented his similar show.
Michael Sheen's Secret Million Pound Giveaway sees the Good Omens actor use £100k of his own money to buy up and write off £1m of debt owed by people in his home town of Port Talbot.
In Bank Job, producers Edelstyn and Powell used debt experts to identify £1m worth of high-interest debt owed by the people of Walthamstow. They raised £40k and bought off the portfolio in full.
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According to Edelstyn and Powell, they were in contact with Sheen and his team between 2017 and 2020 about the actor being involved in their project via email and video correspondence.
Lawyers for the pair sent a letter to Sheen saying they "support Michael Sheen’s efforts to support those treated unjustly in the UK", but that there were "questions as to the originality of the Channel 4 documentary".
Sheen's spokesperson said: "Michael has said many times that the inspiration for him doing something like this came from watching John Oliver buying medical bill debt in the US in 2016. Michael has long campaigned about debt inequality, which is why Full Fat TV came to him with their ambitious proposal.
"They asked Michael to author a campaigning film to drive change in the debt and credit buying industry and to spend £100k of his own money to write off debt of people in his local community."
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A spokesperson for Full Fat TV, the production company behind Sheen's documentary said they "independently developed and pitched Michael Sheen’s Secret Million Pound Giveaway to Channel 4. It is a shame that an important message about the unfairness of the credit system in this country, which Michael spent £100,000 of his own money to highlight, risks being lost due to these unfounded claims.”
Meanwhile, Channel 4 said it didn't know Sheen had been in contact with Optimistic. A Channel 4 spokesperson said: "These two programmes are significantly different and it’s ludicrous to suggest that one is a copy of the other.
"Buying and writing off debt is an established practice which has been covered in the media on multiple occasions and the commissioner who greenlit and worked on Michael Sheen’s Million Pound Giveaway had no awareness of Bank Job."
Reporter, Digital Spy
Harriet is a freelance news writer specialising in TV and movies at Digital Spy.
A horror enthusiast, she joined Digital Spy after working on her own horror website, reviewing films and focusing largely on feminism in the genre.
In her spare time, Harriet paints and produces mixed-media art. She graduated from the University of Kingston with a BA in fine art, where she specialised in painting. She also has an MA in journalism from Birkbeck University.
