Entertainment Law Notes
Entertainment Law Note 1 – 10/19/2013
Law:
Recognize issues, as you hone your craft and run your business.
Caveat:
Watch out! Be careful. What it’s not
Risk management:
To e proactive, but not reactive: when you react about something, it’s too late. Realize the things early than others and avoid the bad things happening.
Producers are performing as attorneys.
Producers are the head of the film. Will be asked lot of questions, should know all the answers.
Filmmakers should know that they will be pressed, continuously, into activities that will demand their knowledge of entertainment law.
What is LAW?
Definition: a body of rules. It has legal consequences that make people obey the law.
Cases:
1. “Natural Born Killers”
Issues: First Amendment, obscenity, censorship, the rating system, FCC regulations.
2. Producer’s idea was stolen by network.
Issues: protecting ideas and pitches, contracts (non disclosure agreements and submission release) intellectual property and copyright.
3. A poster inspired by a photo that used the almost same posture.
Issues: intellectual property, copyright, trademark, patents, fair use.
4. A star agreed to shoot a movie and signed the deal memo. Later she refused to be in the movie and was sued by her agent.
Issues: contracts: oral, written, memos
Agency has power, compensation.
5. Publish celebrities’ names on magazine without letting them know.
Issues: right of privacy, rights to publicity, defamation.
6. The legal structure of business: partnerships corps, LLC’s, insurance, and taxes.
Sources of entertainment law:
1. U.S. Constitution First Amendment: How the constitution affects the filmmaking.
2. Codified Law:
a. Federal Statutes (laws)
b. State Statutes
c. Local Ordinances/Laws. E.g.: LA requires every film getting a permit to shoot.
3. Judicial Decisions: Doctrine of Stare Decisis (let the decision stand). Common law. Court decisions make law.
4. Administrative Agencies (Regulations): FCC
Law:
Recognize issues, as you hone your craft and run your business.
Caveat:
Watch out! Be careful. What it’s not
Risk management:
To e proactive, but not reactive: when you react about something, it’s too late. Realize the things early than others and avoid the bad things happening.
Producers are performing as attorneys.
Producers are the head of the film. Will be asked lot of questions, should know all the answers.
Filmmakers should know that they will be pressed, continuously, into activities that will demand their knowledge of entertainment law.
What is LAW?
Definition: a body of rules. It has legal consequences that make people obey the law.
Cases:
1. “Natural Born Killers”
Issues: First Amendment, obscenity, censorship, the rating system, FCC regulations.
2. Producer’s idea was stolen by network.
Issues: protecting ideas and pitches, contracts (non disclosure agreements and submission release) intellectual property and copyright.
3. A poster inspired by a photo that used the almost same posture.
Issues: intellectual property, copyright, trademark, patents, fair use.
4. A star agreed to shoot a movie and signed the deal memo. Later she refused to be in the movie and was sued by her agent.
Issues: contracts: oral, written, memos
Agency has power, compensation.
5. Publish celebrities’ names on magazine without letting them know.
Issues: right of privacy, rights to publicity, defamation.
6. The legal structure of business: partnerships corps, LLC’s, insurance, and taxes.
Sources of entertainment law:
1. U.S. Constitution First Amendment: How the constitution affects the filmmaking.
2. Codified Law:
a. Federal Statutes (laws)
b. State Statutes
c. Local Ordinances/Laws. E.g.: LA requires every film getting a permit to shoot.
3. Judicial Decisions: Doctrine of Stare Decisis (let the decision stand). Common law. Court decisions make law.
4. Administrative Agencies (Regulations): FCC