The Celebrities Rights Act or Celebrity Rights Act was passed in

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

in 1985, which enabled a

celebrity Celebrity is a condition of fame and broad public recognition of a person or group as a result of the attention given to them by mass media. An individual may attain a celebrity status from having great wealth, their participation in sports ...

personality rights Personality rights, sometimes referred to as the right of publicity, are rights for an individual to control the commercial use of their identity, such as name, image, likeness, or other unequivocal identifiers. They are generally considered as ...

to survive his or her death. Previously, the 1979 ''

Lugosi v. Universal Pictures ''Lugosi v. Universal Pictures'', 603 P.2d 425 (Cal. 1979), was a decision of the Supreme Court of California with regard to the personality rights of celebrities, particularly addressing whether these rights descended to the celebrities' heirs. ...

'' decision by the

California Supreme Court The Supreme Court of California is the highest and final court of appeals in the courts of the U.S. state of California. It is headquartered in San Francisco at the Earl Warren Building, but it regularly holds sessions in Los Angeles and Sacra ...

held that

Bela Lugosi Béla Ferenc Dezső Blaskó (; October 20, 1882 – August 16, 1956), known professionally as Bela Lugosi (; ), was a Hungarian and American actor best remembered for portraying Count Dracula in the 1931 horror classic ''Dracula'', Ygor in ''S ...

's personality rights could not pass to his heirs, as a

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...

would have. The court ruled that any rights of publicity, and rights to his image, terminated with Lugosi's death.

California Civil Code The Civil Code of California is a collection of statutes for the State of California. The code is made up of statutes which govern the general obligations and rights of persons within the jurisdiction of California. It was based on a civil code or ...

section 3344 is for the publicity rights of living persons, while Civil Code section 3344.1, known as the '' Astaire Celebrity Image Protection Act'', grants statutory ''

post mortem An autopsy (post-mortem examination, obduction, necropsy, or autopsia cadaverum) is a surgical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a corpse by dissection to determine the cause, mode, and manner of death or to evaluate any dis ...

'' rights to the estate of a "deceased personality", where: * that personality had been "any natural person whose name, voice, signature, photograph, or likeness has commercial value at the time of his or her death", * any person using such personality's "name, voice, signature, photograph or likeness on or in products, merchandise or goods" without prior consent was liable to be sued for damages and profits arising from the unauthorized use, and * such prior consent may only be given by persons to whom the personality had transferred such power by contract or trust prior to his death, or by trust or will after his death, or, where no such latter provision was made, his spouse, children, and/or grandchildren, but * "a play, book, magazine, newspaper, musical composition, audiovisual work, radio or television program, single and original work of art, work of political or newsworthy value, or an advertisement or commercial announcement for any of these works, shall not be considered a product, article of merchandise, good, or service if it is fictional or nonfictional entertainment, or a dramatic, literary, or musical work." In 1999, the period of protection was extended from fifty years after a person's death to seventy years. Similar laws have been enacted by 12 other states in the United States.

Cases

In 1998

Princess Diana Diana, Princess of Wales (born Diana Frances Spencer; 1 July 1961 – 31 August 1997) was a member of the British royal family. She was the first wife of King Charles III (then Prince of Wales) and mother of Princes William and Harry. Her ac ...

's estate sued the

Franklin Mint The Franklin Mint is a private mint founded by Joseph Segel in 1964 in Wawa, Pennsylvania. The building is in Middletown Township. The brand name was previously owned by Sequential Brands Group headquartered in New York City, New York. It is ...

for selling products bearing her likeness. The lawsuit filed May 18, 1998 in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles said the Franklin Mint "failed to obtain consent to use Princess Diana's identity and trademark ... and embarked on a campaign to profit from Princess Diana's death." On June 27, 2000, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California issued a summary judgment in favor of the Franklin Mint. Franklin Mint countersued Diana's estate's lawyers for "malicious prosecution of trademark"—in January 2011 the law firm settled with a $25 million payment to the former owners of the Franklin Mint. ''Shaw Family Archives Ltd. v. CMG Worldwide, Inc.'', 486 F.Supp.2d 309 (S.D.N.Y., 2007) ruled on May 7, 2007 that in regard to Marilyn Monroe, because she died before California's Celebrity Rights Act was passed in 1985, and the state of New York does not recognize a right of publicity after the artist's death, her name, image, and voice are now in the public domain in the states of California and New York. By implication, they would also be in the public domain in any state that, at the time of Monroe's death in 1962, did not recognize a right of publicity that survived the artist's death. In response to that court ruling, California passed legislation that created descendible rights of publicity that last 70 years after death, retroactively for any person deceased after January 1, 1938. A similar law has failed in the

New York Legislature The New York State Legislature consists of the two houses that act as the state legislature of the U.S. state of New York: The New York State Senate and the New York State Assembly. The Constitution of New York does not designate an official t ...

References

{{reflist, 2

External links

California Civil Code - Section 3344 - 3344.1 (Astaire Celebrity Image Protection Act)

NPR: Personality Rights for Dead ActorsStanford CyberlawShaw v. Marilyn
United States intellectual property law Celebrities Rights Act, California 1985 in law Personality rights Celebrities Rights Act Entertainment law

Cases

References

Further reading

External links