Showtime has been hit with a lawsuit over “George & Tammy” by the property of nation star Tammy Wynette‘s fifth and final husband, George Richey. His heirs contend that the critically acclaimed miniseries disparaged Richey because the “villain” of the tortured love story between Wynette and George Jones, in violation of a earlier non-disparagement settlement with Georgette Jones, the daughter of the titular couple and a key participant within the sequence.

Georgette Jones shouldn’t be named as a defendant; solely Showtime is. However as a result of she was a consulting producer on the miniseries, in addition to being the author of the memoir that was the premise for the script, the lawsuit claims that the 2022 launch of “George & Tammy” represented the community’s “tortious interference” in a 2015 settlement settlement the property had made with Jones to not defame or disparage Richey, performed by Steve Zahn within the sequence

A Showtime spokesperson’s response to the swimsuit, relayed to Selection Thursday night time, was brief and to the purpose: “We see no believable foundation for any declare towards Showtime.”

The swimsuit was filed Thursday in Delaware courtroom on behalf of Sheila Slaughter Richey, the executor of her late husband’s property — she married George Richey in 2001, three years after the 1998 dying of his earlier spouse, Wynette — and the couple’s daughter, Tatum Keys Richey. George Richey died in 2010. Todd V. McMurty of Kentucky and Sean J. Bellew of Delaware are the Richey property’s trial attorneys.

The swimsuit, obtained by Selection, is stuffed with prolonged scene descriptions and even subtitled stills from “George & Tammy,” in addition to interviews given by Georgette Jones, actors Jessica Chastain (who performed Wynette) and Zahn, and sequence creator and showrunner Abe Sylvia. Not one of the actors or creatives are defendants.

The submitting says that the miniseries defames the late Richey in multiply damning methods, “as a devious husband who abused Wynette and Richey’s prior spouse, facilitated and inspired Wynette’s addiciton to prescription painkillers, and engaged in monetary and managerial manipulation of Wynette.”

It additional particulars particular scenes through which, the attorneys say, Richey is seen as facilitating Wynette’s habit to prescription ache killers “to create a dependency,” together with injecting her with Demerol on their wedding ceremony day; fabricating break-in situations at Wynette’s house with the intention to manipulate her into marrying him, for cover; and being bodily abusive towards Wynette and his spouse previous to her.

Moreover, the swimsuit slams printed epilogue titles saying that “George Richey inherited the overwhelming majority of her property” and that “Tammy’s yellow word pads [in which she left significant money to her daughters] had been by no means discovered.” Say the attorneys: “The apparent implication is that Richey destroyed the yellow word pads that contained Wynette’s will.”

The civil litigation between Georgette Jones and the Richey property dates again to 2015, when Richey’s third spouse and daughter requested for redress because of Jones’ 2011 e book, “The Three of Us: Rising Up with Tammy and George.” When that dispute was settled in 2019, the attorneys say, Jones agreed to not make disparaging remarks towards George Richey or his relations. They level to interviews Jones did selling the miniseries through which, requested about Richie’s potential complicity in issues going badly in her mom’s life, she would beg off answering the questions, saying issues like, “All of us needed to signal an settlement, all of us collectively, to say that we wil not focus on one another any additional, so for my very own sake, legally, I’m not allowed to essentially focus on something about Richey or his spouse after Mother, Sheila.”

Regardless of Jones’ not stating her opinion of Richey within the 2022 interviews, the property’s attorneys contend she was nonetheless forbidden by the 2015 settlement from additional selling or inflicting anybody to imagine the statements she’d already made about him in her memoir. Extra to the purpose of Showtime being the only real defendant now, the Richeys’ attorneys say Paramount Networks was conscious of the non-disparagement settlement Jones was topic to when the corporate was adapting her e book and using her as a consulting producer.

The swimsuit asks for Paramount and Showtime to be compelled to withdraw “George & Tammy” from any type of distribution, and to be held liable for restitution in an quantity to be decided in a trial.

Though Showtime relies in New York, Bellew and McMurtry filed the swimsuit in Delaware, citing Showtime Networks having been included there.

Georgette Jones’ administration didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.

When “George & Tammy” premiered in December 2022, it grew to become the most-watched premiere in Showtime’s historical past — a triumph for the corporate in bumping up a mission that had initially been set to premiere through a single cable firm, Spectrum, earlier than getting followup play on Paramount’s properties. Past the scores, additional acclaim got here from the Emmys with 4 nods, together with a pair of appearing nominations for Chastain and Michael Shannon, who performed George Jones.