Running with Lawsuits

A lawsuit filed by the family of Dr. Rodolph H. Turcotte demands a retraction of Augusten Burroughs’ Running With Scissors and a statement that the book is fiction, not memoir. Burroughs wrote about a family called the “Finches,” with whom he lived in the late 1970s. The Turcottes were poorly disguised, the lawsuit says, and were portrayed as “an unhygienic, foul, and mentally unstable cult engaged in bizarre and at times criminal activity.”

Burroughs isn’t saying a word, and neither is St. Martin’s Press. But at least the lawsuit won’t stop the movie&#151due out next year with Gwyneth Paltrow, Annette Bening, Alec Baldwin, Vanessa Redgrave, and directed by Nip/Tuck creator Ryan Murphy.

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