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OFF BEAT: Sylvester Stallone sued for stealing 'Expendables' idea

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Tough guy actor Sylvester Stallone is being accused of being a copycat.

Writer Marcus Webb is suing Mr. Stallone in federal court in New York, charging that Mr. Stallone stole his Mr. Webb’s idea for the movie, “The Expendables.”

Mr. Webb says in his lawsuit filed Oct. 25 that the 2010 movie, which is about an elite group of professional soldiers with a mission to overthrow a dictator, is “strikingly similar and in some places identical” to a script he had copyrighted in 2006 called “The Cordoba Caper.”

Mr. Webb said he had presented the script to Hollywood studios between 2006 and 2009.

According to reports, the lawsuit lists 22 alleged similarities between the two works, including that both open with a hostage rescue at sea off of a foreign coast, which has nothing to do with the main plot.

Mr. Webb is seeking unspecified damages and a court order to stop “further infringement” by Mr. Stallone, who is now filming “The Expendables 2” in Bulgaria with Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis and Jason Statham. It is expected to be released in August 2012.

This is not the first time Mr. Stallone has been sued. According to reports, retired boxer Chuck Wepner, whom Mr. Stallone had cited as the inspiration for the original “Rocky” movie, sued him in 2003 for failing to compensate him for his life story.

The case was settled out of court in 2006.

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