Michael Oher recieved $138K in ‘Blind Side’ profits, checks arrived as recently as April: court docs
Michael Oher received $138,000 in profits from “The Blind Side” — with him even receiving a check in April this year.
The retired NFL player, 37, accused his adoptive parents of stiffing him on royalties from the Hollywood movie about his life in August.
But in a new court filing Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy included evidence of 10 separate payments totaling $138,311 from them to Oher between June 2007 and April 2023, according to ESPN.
“By agreement between the family members including Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy, their children SJ and Collins as well as Michael Oher, the book and movie proceeds were to be split five ways,” according to a statement accompanying the accounting document filed by the Tuohys’ lawyers.
Oher was taken in as a teen and raised like a son by the Tuohy family, who eventually helped broker his deals to enter the NFL.
During his career he earned around $34 million, according to sources.
However, Oher claimed the Tuohys had “collectively received millions of dollars and Michael received nothing for his rights” to “the film “The Blind Side” which starred Sandra Bullock, who won an Oscar for her role.
In their legal filing, the Tuohy family reiterated what they have said before — that Oher received an equal cut to proceeds from “The Blindside” as Sean, Leigh Anne and their two children.
Their argument has long been that the film simply didn’t make them very much money. They filing also noted how the couple had “spent tens of thousands of dollars of their own money to support Mr. Oher during his high school and college years.”
Also included in the new filings by the Tuohys were copies of tax forms which showed their end of the bargain — with payments of more than $432,000 by Twentieth Century Fox, Alcon Film Fund and Left Tackle Pictures between 2007 and 2021.
It also included a list that allegedly shows payments the Tuohys made to Oher, as well as deposits the couple made to a bank account in the name of one of Oher’s children.
The order that required the accounting notes that Oher has until Nov. 28 to file any objections to the document.
In his August petition filed in Shelby County, Tenn., probate court Oher alleged the Tuohys had swindled him out of his dues from “The Blind Side” and claimed he only learned earlier this year that he was under a conservatorship as opposed to having been adopted.
He also claimed the couple had used that arrangement to keep the movie millions from him.
The Tuohy family vehemently denied the claims. Their attorneys have said the couple referred to Oher as their son “in the colloquial sense” and that they never intended that reference to be viewed with legal implications.
Since the petition was filed, Oher’s conservatorship was ended. It was previously reported that Oher could have ended the conservatorship at any time he wished after turning 18 years old.
Oher played left tackle at Ole Miss, which was the alma mater of Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy.
A first-round pick in the 2009 NFL Draft, Oher had an eight-year NFL career with the Ravens, Titans and Panthers.
