7:05 PM
Kelsey Long
The first legal liability in regards to my business plan is liabilities in regards to safety. This one in particular is from an article about Broadway's Spiderman: Turn Off the Dark. Although this legal battle happened earlier in the year, it made industry news as well as national news. Back in December of last year, it seemed like every week there was a new story about how one of the actors got seriously hurt attempting to perform one of the shows spectacular stunts. After several of theses issues taking place, the show was struck with two safety violations from the New York State Department of Labor. Although, these violations did not cost the show any money, it could have cost them some of their stunts which made the show so noteworthy. After the violations were put in place, the safety officials would continue to perform unannounced inspections. During these inspections, if any of the safety measures put in place in December weren't followed, "the inspectors were authorized to withdraw variances issued last year allowing aerial sequences of actors playing Spider-Man and the villains Green Goblin and Arachne flying over the audience" (New York Times News Service, 2011). In this case, I completely agree with the state. There were special safety measures put in place after a serious fall in December by cast member Christopher Tierney. Obviously the producers of Spiderman had been in the right by getting permission to execute these stunts, but they couldn't continue to violate safety protocol in order to get them done. People couldn't continue to get seriously hurt. Since then, Spiderman seems to be doing a lot better and have altered much of their material.
The second legal liability in regards to my business plan is that of copyright infringement. One notable battle that recently took place was between the Broadway production of Fela!, and the author who wrote a biography on the real person Fela Anikulapo-Kuti himeself. Here is an interesting article about the issue. The author, Carlos Moore claimed that the stage version stole bits and pieces of his book and that these were word for word. The one thing that I find odd about this is that Stephen Hendel, the producer of the Broadway show stated that Moore had been completely supportive of the show from the beginning and had sat in on off-Broadway performances. He even appeared in a video supporting the production that you can see here. I guess I just remain a little confused. I would have to have read to biography and seen the show to determine how similar they really were and if in fact the show took exerpts from the book. Either way it just seems odd how Carlos Moore came out long after the show had been in production. Was he just waiting to claim a lawsuit?
The third liability in relation to my business plan both deals with copyright issues and issues of defamatory statements. This is a somewhat recent controversy regarding a Chicago production of Urinetown. Here is the article. It all started when The Broadway Team's Lawyer, Ronald H. Shechtman accused the Chicago production of plagerising major aspects of the original Broadway production. He was convinced that although the Chicago production had licensing to the script and songs, it shouldn't allow them to use direction, coreography, and design. After Shechtman's accusation, it was proven that the Chicago production did in fact have licensing for all aspects of the production. The Chicago production's lawyer, David M. Adler went on to pursue legal action in regards to defamatory statements said about the Chicago production that weren't true. Apparently the cast, crew, and production team were very worried about their reputation after these statements were made. I think this goes to show that before you accuse someone of plagerism, it is extremely important to make sure that you have done your research as well, or you could land in a lawsuit of your own!
The second legal liability in regards to my business plan is that of copyright infringement. One notable battle that recently took place was between the Broadway production of Fela!, and the author who wrote a biography on the real person Fela Anikulapo-Kuti himeself. Here is an interesting article about the issue. The author, Carlos Moore claimed that the stage version stole bits and pieces of his book and that these were word for word. The one thing that I find odd about this is that Stephen Hendel, the producer of the Broadway show stated that Moore had been completely supportive of the show from the beginning and had sat in on off-Broadway performances. He even appeared in a video supporting the production that you can see here. I guess I just remain a little confused. I would have to have read to biography and seen the show to determine how similar they really were and if in fact the show took exerpts from the book. Either way it just seems odd how Carlos Moore came out long after the show had been in production. Was he just waiting to claim a lawsuit?
The third liability in relation to my business plan both deals with copyright issues and issues of defamatory statements. This is a somewhat recent controversy regarding a Chicago production of Urinetown. Here is the article. It all started when The Broadway Team's Lawyer, Ronald H. Shechtman accused the Chicago production of plagerising major aspects of the original Broadway production. He was convinced that although the Chicago production had licensing to the script and songs, it shouldn't allow them to use direction, coreography, and design. After Shechtman's accusation, it was proven that the Chicago production did in fact have licensing for all aspects of the production. The Chicago production's lawyer, David M. Adler went on to pursue legal action in regards to defamatory statements said about the Chicago production that weren't true. Apparently the cast, crew, and production team were very worried about their reputation after these statements were made. I think this goes to show that before you accuse someone of plagerism, it is extremely important to make sure that you have done your research as well, or you could land in a lawsuit of your own!
