Blindsided by the blind side. All a sham?

I highly doubt that.

You are assuming we're talking about modest sums.

 

By all accounts the family received $700k from book/movie of which $140k was Ohers share. Sooner or dlater the facts are going to overwhelm the narrative on the financial aspects of this.

 

We shall see. It seems quite odd to me that Oher would do all this if he has tens of millions in the bank and the family has done everything on the up and up.

One other perplexing bit is that the movie only had a reported budget of about $30 million. It made over $300 million at the box office and another $100+ million in DVD sales. If they were getting a cut of the profits, it's odd that it's not more than $700k. (Then again, movie studios are known for engaging in shady accounting practices to try and screw people out of royalties.)

 

Oh, Good For You...

Like you have any "inside information"? It's all speculation at this point, I'm speculating that Oher is full of sh$t. He's looking for a pay day like all pieces of sh$t do.

 

I’ve seen 2.5% of “defined net proceeds” quoted several places. You can be pretty sure that is a lot less than box office gross. Do the math and divide it five ways and it is an immaterial amount for either the family or Oher. I suspect Oher doesn’t have a clue what has been made.



https://www.newsnationnow.com/enter...hington University,older) since at least 1972.



It’s all about the money
Adding to Oher’s annoyance? Not only did his “adoptive” family use his name and their “adoption” to promote their foundation and Leigh Anne’s work as an author and motivational speaker … they also profited handsomely off the movie, whereas Oher didn’t get anything. According to the legal filing, the movie paid the Tuohys and their two biological children $225,000 each, plus 2.5% of the film’s “defined net proceeds” while Oher “gave away” his life rights to 20th Century Fox Studios.

As for making money off “The Blind Side,” Sean Tuohy told the Daily Memphian: “We didn’t make any money off the movie. Well, Michael Lewis (the author of the book ‘The Blind Side’) gave us half of his share. Everybody in the family got an equal share, including Michael. It was about $14,000, each.”

But Sean Tuohy told a different story when he was interviewed by Barstool Sports, admitting he made “60 or 70 grand” over the years from the movie residuals, money Oher claims he’s never received.

 

sure thing, Fred

 

An alternative scenario is really what this is about is by not legally adopting him (as an adult ) he isn’t in line to receive a share of the $200 million net worth of the family, although realistically anybody that has that wealth likely has wills and trusts that designate desired shares of distribution. I suspect this whole affair has reduced his chance of ever seeing any of that family fortune.

 

If it's 2.5% of net proceeds, that should be a lot of money. As I said, the movie's stated budget was $29 million. Its box office gross was $309 million. It made another $107 million in DVD sales. It likely made money in other areas too. Certainly, there are other costs (marketing, DVD production, etc.). But this was a highly successful and profitable film. It's hard to believe that 2.5% wasn't worth millions. If they didn't get paid a lot of money, I'd be looking into the film studio's accounting.

EDIT: This website has different numbers than Wikipedia, but they're still massive. It shows that between home DVD/BluRay sales and the box office gross, the film grossed just short of $434 million.
The Blind Side (2009) - Financial Information

Here's the site with the box office gross at $309 million and the production budget at $29 million:
The Blind Side - Box Office Mojo

 

FAQ: Sorting out 'Blind Side' claims

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/08/16/michael-lewis-blind-side-lawsuit/

 

Its “defined net proceeds”.

look in the wapo article I linked above. Michael Lewis describes the contract. At this point you have to believe all of the people reciting specific facts are outright lying, vs Oher who presents nothing but broad and vague unsupported assertions.




In a legal filing this week, Oher alleged that the Tuohy family used a conservatorship to keep profits from the movie, which the court filing argued paid the Tuohys and their two birth children each $225,000, plus 2.5 percent of the film’s “defined net proceeds.” The movie was a hit, earning more than $300 million in theaters, according to Oher’s lawsuit.

According to Lewis, Twentieth Century Fox, as it was then known, paid $250,000 for the option to make “The Blind Side” a movie, which he split 50-50 with the Tuohy family. The Tuohys have said they split their share evenly, including with Oher. After taxes and agent fees, Lewis said, his half was around $70,000.

Fox, however, never made the movie. (According to Lewis, the studio had thought Julia Roberts would be interested in the film, but she wasn’t.) Instead, Lewis said, Alcon, a small production company backed by Tuohy’s neighbor, FedEx CEO Fred Smith, stepped in. Instead of paying the actors large salaries, Lewis said, they were offered a share of the profits. Lewis said his deal provided him a share of the movie’s net profits, too. Warner Bros. distributed the movie.

According to Lewis, the film made around half a billion dollars but the equity stake in the movie was not as lucrative as it would appear. In fact, he said, he had called his own representatives at Creative Artists Agency over the years, following the movie’s success, asking about his share of the profits. Lewis said that ultimately after agent fees and taxes, he and the Tuohy family received around $350,000 each from the profits of the movie. Lewis said the Tuohys planned to share the royalties among the family members, including Oher, but Oher began declining his royalty checks, Lewis said. Lewis said he believed that the Tuohy family had deposited Oher’s share in a trust fund for Oher’s son.

 

If that's what Lewis is saying, then I'll take his word for it. As I said, the studios engage in dishonest accounting to screw people out of royalties, and some folks have called them on it and gone after them. Sounds like they engaged in that sort of accounting here.

That all said, not the biggest fan of Lewis after seeing some of the shitty things he said about Oher. Regardless, I can understand why Oher is suspicious when it does appear they lied to him about the nature of what they were doing with the conservatorship versus adoption.

 

what did Lewis say that was shitty?

I will admit the whole conservatorship thing is odd. It seems like they did it because it was easier to do than adoption, and perhaps it looked less suspicious to the NCAA. However the general consensus seems to be he isn’t mentally disabled so technically he wouldn’t normally qualify but if everybody agrees including the mother perhaps they let it fly. It seems kind of greasy, but more from a standpoint of doing it to get him into Ole Miss. I haven’t seen any evidence that Oher was financially exploited in any way - in fact I suspect he is much better off from their financial management.

In his book in 2011 Oher states that the family was his conservators but it isn’t really clear he knows what that means. Now he is saying he was unaware of the conservatorship.

I’m not sure what to make about the adoption / not adoption. I suspect it was not done for practical or legal purposes as an adult, it is mostly legally irrelevant and it may have looked more suspicious to the NCAA. Having said that Oher seems to have taken it personally. The family always stating he was adopted when he legally wasn’t does come off as a bit manipulative. Maybe it was done in good faith, or maybe it was manipulation. I don’t know.

 

At some speech he gave a few years back, he mocked Oher's intelligence and said some other disparaging things about Black collegiate athletes.

The article you posted contests that claim:
FAQ: Sorting out 'Blind Side' claims
Why did the family not seek an adoption instead of conservatorship?
Sean Tuohy told The Memphian: "We contacted lawyers who had told us that we couldn't adopt over the age of 18; the only thing we could do was to have a conservatorship. We were so concerned it was on the up-and-up that we made sure the biological mother came to court."

Elizabeth Psar, a Knoxville family attorney who has been practicing for 19 years, told ESPN the Tuohys could have adopted Oher, as long as his birth parents were notified and he agreed to the process. According to documents, Oher's mother, Denise Oher, signed off on the conservatorship.

"Adults can be adopted in Tennessee, but, obviously, the adults have to consent to it," she said. For someone to be adopted, she said, it would have taken having a lawyer file a court petition. "It would have been easy to file that, like you would anything else," Psar said.

I'd say it all makes his perspective easier to understand. He might be totally wrong on the financials. But it's easy to see how somebody in his shoes would find out that they misled him on the adoption, become skeptical of everything they've done, and then hear about the 2.5% royalties, see how much the film made, and assume they pocketed that money. I still haven't seen a satisfactory explanation from them for why becoming a conservator made sense over adopting him.

 

I haven’t seen the disparaging comments from Lewis. That doesn’t seem in character for him.

fair point on the relative ease of adoption. My guess is they thought that adoption would raise antennae of NCAA - take in a talented prospect, shower him with wealth, then adopt him as an adult and then send to your alma mater. I read in one of these accounts there were already accusations from other schools floating around. With a conservatorship perhaps it makes it seem superficially more needs based.

 

In the end this family write a fiction that makes them millions... and the young man in the NFL is thankful that he had a family take him in and nurture hem to the point where he was GIVEN an opportunity in life that not many poor black youths ever get... a stable place to call home.... food... clothes... shelter... and a caring family with a father figure.

 

I think let’s wait and see is still the right answer. Both sides stories seem plausible. Greed and money do strange things to people.

 

Oops left out fame. Greed, money, and fame do weird things to people.

 

You raise an interesting point. I wonder if all these years Michael has been in their will.

 

Oher is a lying POS: Michael Oher received $100K in 'Blind Side' profits