Fox Ordered to Pay $179 Million in Lawsuit Over ‘Bones’ Profit Dispute

An arbitrator has ordered 21st Century Fox to pay $178.7 million to David Boreanaz, Emily Deschanel, executive producer Barry Josephson, and author Kathy Reichs over withheld revenue from the now-canceled TV series Bones. “This is a tremendous victory for the Bones profit participants who created and starred in the longest-running drama series to air on the FOX network,” Josephson’s attorney Kinsella said following the decision. 

“The more these individuals testified,” arbitrator Peter Lichtman stated in his decision of the testimonies of the studio’s top executives, “the more incredulous their testimony appeared.” Lichtman was especially critical of Fox for their “cavalier attitude toward its wrongdoing.”

21st Century Fox will fight to have the punitive damages of $128.5 million from the decision thrown out without contesting the $50.2 million in actual damages which would be handed down to Bones’ EPs. “The ruling by this private arbitrator is categorically wrong on the merits and exceeded his arbitration powers,” the studio said in a statement, per Deadline.

Josephson sued Fox over profit participation in November 2015. Less than a week later, Deschanel and Boreanaz, the series’ actors and producers, filed a suit of their own, claiming they and Reichs were “cheated out of more than $100 million in gross revenues and being overcharged many additional millions of dollars in alleged expenses.” On April 8, 2016, their consolidated cases were taken to behind closed doors arbitration with the remaining matters settled in private. 

“We are so proud of the hard work we did on Bones for 12 seasons and only ever wanted Fox to live up to its promises and contractual obligations,” Deschanel said in a statement. “It’s clear that what we were saying all along was true: we were owed additional compensation for our work,” Boreanaz said. “Now I can only hope that Fox is made to settle its obligations to us without further delay.”