From cbc.ca:

The charity that manages the estate of British writer J.R.R. Tolkien has sued the studio behind the Lord of the Rings film trilogy, saying it hasn’t been paid a cent for granting the rights to the story.

The Tolkien Trust and publisher HarperCollins filed suit against New Line Cinema in a Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday.

The suit is claiming $150 million US in damages and threatens to revoke New Line’s right to make The Hobbit, another Tolkien tale, into a film.

The suit claims New Line has not paid any part of the 7.5 per cent of gross receipts from the films it promised in return for rights to film the story.

Tolkien, who died in 1973, is the world-renowned author of the Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit.

The filing estimates return from the three Lord of the Ring films — The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King — at $6 billion US, but says New Line has not allowed it to audit the last two films of the series.

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