Million Dollar Kitty
posted by Frank Pasquale
Grand Central Publishing recently paid a $1.25 million advance for the story of Dewey the Library Cat. Apparently the book
will tell the story of how the kitten was found in the late-night book drop of the public library in Spencer, Iowa, a town in the northwest part of the state, and adopted by Ms. Myron and the other librarians. Slowly, over the course of his 19-year life, Dewey became a town mascot who lifted the spirits of residents hit hard by the 1980s farming crisis.
Dewey’s story will “need to sell at least 250,000 copies in hardcover to cover the cost of the advance.” Which leads me to wonder–what exactly are they paying for here? The co-authors will be “Vicki Myron, the head librarian in Spencer, Iowa; and Bret Witter, a former editorial director at Health Communications, the publisher of the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” books.” Certainly Ms. Myron has the inside scoop on taking care of Dewey, and Witter’s helped churn out buckets of spirit-lifting pablum. But is the advance really about something more, like the “life story” rights?
I’ve always found life story rights a bit puzzling. If a docudrama is basically a retelling of something that has happened, anyone can “use” those facts. But a brief glance at a bit of a sample “life story” agreement reveals some reasons why someone may want to buy “life rights.” Here is some of the language:
(a) Upon exercise of the option, Purchaser shall own the exclusive right throughout the world, in perpetuity, to produce, distribute, exhibit, license and otherwise exploit, in any and all media (now known or hereafter devised), motion pictures, television productions and other audiovisual works of all kinds (the “Works”), including without limitation sequels and remakes, based on or portraying your life story or depicting you, as well as exclusive ancillary rights . . . to use your name, likeness and other identifying characteristics in connection with the Works.
(b) You agree that in producing the Works, Purchaser shall have the right to add to, delete from, modify and fictionalize your life story and you waive all claims arising therefrom, except in the event of intentional defamation of you.
So the real advantage for the purchaser of the “life story” rights is fending off potential defamation or right of publicity lawsuits. One query–does purchase of the life rights of some notable figure also give the purchaser the same right to sue others that the seller agreed not to enforce against the purchaser? Then I could see these agreements being quite potent…for an aggressive purchaser may threaten virtually any rival storyteller in the marketplace of ideas with some kind of right of publicity or defamation suit.
Photo Credit: Flickr/Huxleyesque. No, that’s not Dewey…no way I’m risking a copyright suit with that feline corporate juggernaut.
April 8, 2007 at 3:54 pm
Posted in: Intellectual Property
Print This Post
Responses (3)
Al - April 8, 2007 at 9:17 pm
Frank,
Thanks for this; I love the story. Isn’t the publisher paying an advance for the book by Ms. Myron and Mr. Witter? It sounds like a pretty standard advance contract (except in size of the advance). Someone else could tell the story of Dewey, but I doubt they could do it as well as the librarian and the accomplished author.
Frank - April 8, 2007 at 10:36 pm
Thanks, Al. Yes, you’re right, it’s just a standard advance, but I’m just wondering why one would need to pay so much to these authors. I suppose I’m taking a bit of license with the story, and just speculating on how the right of publicity issues might spin out had the publisher clearly negotiated for them.
Another bizarre trusts & estates of pets question comes up for me–does Dewey have a right of publicity? if the library “owned” him, would it descend to the library upon his death? or perhaps they owned it all along?
Bruce Boyden - April 9, 2007 at 2:15 pm
Buying the rights to a person’s life story poses some interesting issues, but I’m not sure they’re present here. It could just be that the publisher is paying the authors a chunk of the expected proceeds so that they don’t go give all that profit to some other publisher. I.e., the publisher may be the winning bidder of an informal auction. If the publisher has a knack for this sort of thing, they will have paid (a) just barely enough to get the authors to sign with them, while (b) not so much that they won’t make any money off of it.
Leave a Reply