POP/ROCK - May 2, 1988

The heavy-metal rock group Poison was sued last week by its managers in a $45.5-million breach-of-contract suit that contends drugs and alcohol are causing the group’s already volatile members to get out of hand. The suit, filed Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court by Sanctuary Music, alleges that Poison breached a five-year promotion contract. After some early hit singles, fame and fortune went to the band members’ heads, the suit said. At a concert last June in Greenville, S.C., the group “stormed off the stage, screaming and yelling at the production crew” for not installing certain neon lights on the stage, according to the suit. The band members’ personalities were “made more noticeably volatile in part due to the drugs and alcohol they began to ingest with increasing frequency,” the suit said.