QUESTION
Can I charge money for the libretto of a play I wrote that has characters owned by a company?
Asked on Aug 27th, 2012 on Patents - Utah
More details to this question:
This is actually a copyright law question, not patent, but that wasn't on the list. I wrote an opera starring the Mario Brothers from Nintendo's popular line of video games. I put on the opera for free. Now someone wants to buy the libretto and put on their own productions. My questions are: 1) Can I charge them for my works, since I do not own these characters? Everything else (music, words, etc) is original. 2) If they would put on the show, could they legally charge money for admittance? 3) Does affect matters at all that they live in Canada?
2 ANSWERS
Although you have created the original elements of the play, it is based upon a pre-existing owrk. Therefore, your work is a derivitive and you need to get a copyright release from whoever owns the Mario Brothers before you can display or distribute your work. It doesn't make any difference that the potential purchasers of your work are from Canada. Check with your local copyright attorney to see if your work qualifies as a parody as that may be a possible exception to copyright law.
Answered on Aug 29th, 2012 at 11:14 PM
Intellectual Property Attorney serving South Jordan, UT
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Pearson Butler
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Sometimes there is a fair use exception for using characters of others. Whether this applies to you or not depends a lot on the opera itself: its content and message. This is a situation where you probably need an attorney to review the details and issue a formal opinion for your circumstances. If you sell it without that opinion and the other company gets sued, you might be liable for their legal expenses plus any damages. Alternatively, you can sign an agreement with the company that specifically puts all liability on their head.
Answered on Aug 27th, 2012 at 4:27 PM