An up-and-coming writer asked me when he should hire an attorney. The glib answer is "everytime you sign a contract." But, lawyers are expensive and when you're just starting out, may not always be totally necessary. Here are my thoughts. 1/ If you are selling or optioning your original script, you should almost always have a lawyer on your team. Even if you are selling something being made for a low budget, you never know what the long-term value of the script could be. 2/

If you're a screenwriter who gets handed a contract, but doesn't have a lawyer, here are some things to keep in mind so you don't get completely screwed over. Bookmark this tweet and save it for when that contract comes through 1/ ➡️Your 1st contract will probably be an option/purchase contract. That means the producer will have an exclusive period ("the option period) to purchase your script. My first rule is: The less money they pay you for the option, the shorter the option period 1/

Screenwriter Tip: If you are selling your script for very little $, because it's a low-budget horror movie, insist on retaining derivative rights. I know a writer who took $2k for a script on a $100k movie. But the contract says that the producer now owns sequel rights 1/ That means the producer can make endless sequels without paying the writer any additional money. Many low-budget horror movies ended up having numerous sequels (e.g., Paranormal Activity, Blair Witch, etc.). 2/

Following up on my prior tweet threat about "life rights" agreements, one thing you should NOT do is to use the names of real people (friends, schoolmates) in your script w/out permission. Why not? Well, first, it is not going to make a difference to the audience 1/ Second, it could result in a defamation lawsuit (not right of publicity, as discussed earlier). Two examples: In the movie The Crush, which was a Fatal Attraction type movie with a 15 year-old antagonist (Alicia Silverstone), the writer named the villain Darien 2/

I got a call from a screenwriter who submitted a script about a long-dead entertainer (50+ years) and the producers wanted to know if the writer had obtained "life rights" from the estate or whether they were in the "public domain." This is insanity 1/ You don't need someone's "life rights" to make a movie about them (this goes double for dead people.) This was decided 40+ years ago in Guglielmi v. Spelling-Goldberg Productions. In that case, Rudolph Valentino's nephew sued over a TV movie about the famous actor 2/

The oral argument in Horror Inc. v. Miller was just posted. Here's my take on what happened. Note: If you're not a copyright lawyer, a lot of this is a technical discussion of copyright law 1drv.ms/u/s!AjITuijrKm… First up was Horror Inc.'s (i.e., Sean Cunningham's) lawyer Kathleen Sullivan. Her main argument was that the lower court erred by not considering the fact that this was a WGA agreement as part of the CCNV v. Reid factors. The judges gave a lot of push back to this argument

Here's the story about how @BarackObama and @PerkinsCoieLLP are trying to steal my client's trademark. 1/
bit.ly/2ZIqc5e My client has been using the name Higher Ground Enterprises for her business for over 10 years and obtained a federal trademark in 2017. In May 2018, Obama filed a trademark application for "Higher Ground Productions." 2/

Being that the intersection between Copyright law and Horror is my niche, here are some thoughts on the lawsuit brought by The Satanic Temple against Netflix contending that the show "Chilling Adventures of Sabrina" infringed TST's statue of Baphomet bit.ly/2RN7dTA /1 The story got a lot of press, mostly because TST asked for $50,000,000 in damages. Keep in mind that one can put whatever number they want in the complaint. It mostly just means that TST's lawyer has a lot of chutzpah. /2