Emmys 2014: Woody Harrelson tells Matthew McConaughey 'I'm grateful you had the plagiarised lines in True Detective'

The actors, who are the lead stars in the hit HBO series, joked while presenting an award at the Emmys last night

Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson on stage at the 66th Primetime Emmy Awards (Reuters)

Though the writer of hit TV show True Detective has been batting off claims of plagiarism, the subject was fodder for some awards ceremony banter last night after its stars, Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson, quipped about the issue on stage at the Emmys.

The two had started to present the award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or Movie by telling the audience anecdotes about each other and poking fun.

Harrelson then retorted, in a seemingly unplanned manner: “I'm grateful you had all the plagiarised lines,” to which McConaughey immediately chortled a loud “Ha!” at.

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“Was that too much of an inside joke?” McConaughey says, over Harrelson who also laughs: “Okay, that was a little too inside”.

They then hurriedly cut to properly introducing the award, which was won by Benedict Cumberbatch for his stellar performance as Sherlock Holmes.

On a side note, of the six the nominees for that category four were British, also including Idris Elba, Martin Freeman and Chiwetel Ejiofor.

Earlier this year, the popular series True Detective was dogged by accusations that its writer, Nic Pizzolatto, borrowed portions of his protagonist’s dialogue from horror author Thomas Ligotti.

Pizzolatto, who is also executive producer of the show, has outright denied the claim, which had been made by internet bloggers and fans of Ligotti’s work.

Pizzolatto said in a statement: “The philosophical thoughts expressed by Rust Cohle [Matthew McConaughey’s character] do not represent any thought or idea unique to any one author; rather these are the philosophical tenets of a pessimistic, anti-natalist philosophy with an historic tradition including Arthur Schopenauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, E.M. Cioran, and various other philosophers, all of whom express these ideas.

“As an autodidact pessimist, Cohle speaks toward that philosophy with erudition and in his own words.”