Full Monty star who ‘flashed’ runner drops Disney legal fight
Hugo Speer is counting the cost after being sacked from a TV sequel to The Full Monty after allegations of inappropriate conduct. Speer, 53, who played guy, nicknamed ‘Lunchbox’ in the 1997 British comedy hit about a group of unemployed Sheffield men trying to make ends meet as strippers, had his contract terminated by Disney+ during filming last summer after it was said that he answered a knock at the door of his trailer in the nude and ‘beckoned’ a runner inside. He’s always denied the claims of misconduct and after the incident last July it can now be revealed that he consulted lawyers with a view to suing Disney+.
I’m told: ‘Hugh felt that what happened was unfair and discriminatory and wanted to sue them at an industrial tribunal. However, after months of legal to-ing and fro-ing he’s decided to give up the fight.
‘ He’s dropped it because Disney were throwing everything at it, and it all became too expensive to continue.
‘His legal team thought that he had a really good case but in the end he took a good look at what it was going to take to follow it all the way and decided that it wasn’t possible to continue.’
A runner on the movie, who is in her 20s, reportedly said she knocked on Speer’s door and the actor answered without any clothes on, and he then gestured to her to come in.
SoMereports claimed Speer defended his actions by telling producers: ‘Al l actors walk around their trailer stark b****** naked.’ A source on set told The Sun that Speer’s sacking had ‘ rocked the cast and crew’.
A spokesperson for Disney+ said at the time: ‘ We were made aware of allegations of inappropriate conduct by Hugo Speer on the set of a commissioned production.
‘As is policy, an investigation was launched. upon its completion, the decision was made to terminate his contract, with immediate effect.’
A spokesman for Speer countered: ‘He denies all allegations and will be challenging them.’
Speer was previously in BBC series Hearts And Bones and the Sky drama series Britannia. He also stars as a detective in the series London Kills. The third and fourth series of the latter show were filmed concurrently in spring 2022, before the alleged on-set incident and the fourth series will go out on the BBC later this year.
All the original stars of The Full Monty — Speer, robert Carlyle, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Addy, paul Barber, Steve Huison and Lesley Sharp — plus screenwriter Simon Beaufoy and producer uberto pasolini, signed up to be in the Disney+ TV follow-up.
The 1997 hit was the highest grossing film ever in the uK until Titanic. The new eight-part TV series will show what has become of the characters 25 years on.
In an interview in 2020 Speer said that the hit film had changed his life, but not completely for the better. There was ‘scary’ attention from female fans who wanted to grab him intimately, and Speer remarked that if a man was doing that to a woman he would be arrested.
A spokesman for Speer did not respond to requests for comment.