How does one solicit rights?

[darquegk]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 4:08pm

What is the best, most efficient or standardized way to solicit the rights to a published, copyrighted work for adaptation?

My past four produced shows have been either original or based on works in the public domain. For my next piece, I have my eyes on a minor novel by a slightly notable author, but am somewhat unsure of how to actively go about getting permission to adapt that work for the stage.

Does anyone have real advice for me?

[PatrickDennis92]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 4:26pm

First, I don't know you at all (you know how some people on here know each other?) so I don't know how to place your level of experience in the context of what a living author or the estate of a dead author would think of you personally. That will impact their readiness to treat you like a human being or not.

I will assume, and it's not a value judgment certainly, that for our purposes, your level of experience is not at a level that they would find interesting or useful. Again, forgive me, I'm merely recreating the cold real world in which we live.

Since they won't think of you as a power player or creative genius, you have two options. First, you can pay them a lot of money, or bring them someone with a lot of money who says they will produce the show. That will work.

Barring that, you can write the adaptation without permission. Write it, make it super good, and then somehow expose your work in a way that won't get you in trouble. Contact the author or estate, say you'd like to do an adaptation, and that you'd like to invite them to a reading of it, etc. Asking for permission to adapt the work is different from asking them for permission to present an adaptation you have already written. If they say no, do the reading anyway, and then have people blog about how good it was. Doing a reading of a work to which you don't own the rights is only problematic if the owner of the work can prove financial damages. If no tickets are sold, and it wasn't open to the public, there are no financial damages and as such, you are fine... it was merely an academic exercise. If the work is genuinely good, the owner of the work will come around. If it's not good, you might just piss them off forever... but that's fine.

[g.d.e.l.g.i.]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 4:28pm

My understanding is that you get in touch with the author's agent and inquire if theatrical rights (being careful in this instance to denote that you are seeking stage and not film rights) are available for the piece.

[eperkins]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 4:34pm

I have some real advice for you. Ask for the rights. You have no idea how they may receive your request, so I would not worry about it - just go ahead and do it. And getting in touch with the author's agent is the way to do it. If you don't know who the agent is, you can inquire through the publisher - they will know. And as gdelgi said, be specific as to what rights you are requesting. It wouldn't hurt to mention why you think you are the right person for the job.

[KylePKJP]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 4:47pm

With the exception of contacting the author, agent or estate, I'd throw most of PatrickDennis's cold, cruel world reality check for you out the window.

Contact them. Hell, write your adaptation anyway and then contact them. If they ask to see you you'll have something in your hand to show. But do it. If you're not known to a wide audience or judged to be of someone else's idea of importance... who gives a sh*t? I don't think that means sh*t. Just go for it!!!

The absolute worst thing that can happen is someone says "no." Not even that means the door is closed. You can alter your adaptation so that it is a piece "inspired" or "suggested" by the original source material. The 1996 film Up Close and Personal is billed in the credits as being "Suggested by the book 'Golden Girl' by Alana Nash."

Find a name, an address and put it out there!!! Whatever comes back to you will inform your next step. But surely do it. Don't accept defeatist advice or start off with it. Write your work and get it out to the people.

Rootin' for ya! :)

[eperkins]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 4:53pm

I wouldn't actually write the piece without having the rights, unless you do know you can easily adapt it to a non-infringing work. But then if you could do that, there might not be a reason to have the rights to the book in the first place.

[PatrickDennis92]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 4:54pm

I should add something, based on the last couple of comments. I apologize, I did not actually answer your question-- I interpreted it in a strange way. They are absolutely correct; you must contact the author through the agent as they mention as the first step. I assumed since you said you'd had work produced that you would have known to do that first. What I was really answering was a question about under what circumstances well-known authors typically say yes, and what to do if they say no. There are always exceptions, of course. The heart of my message was really to say not to take no for an answer if you really feel passionate about the work. Some people may disagree with me on that, but that's what I was saying. It was a little less warm sounding I admit, but I, too, am "rootin for ya".

Updated On: 3/5/13 at 04:54 PM

[KylePKJP]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 5:02pm

I'd give a rough draft a go, regardless of posession of rights. As long as you keep it to yourself there is no harm. Give yourself a clearer idea of what your adaptation will be/look like/feel like etc. You might discover some roadblocks to achieving a finished piece, or you may simply find an adaptation didn't work, after all, the way you envisioned it.

If someone were to enquire about rights to something I had done I would want to have and hear from him/her a clear vision before I gave a blessing or rights to go forth. The lack of one would turn me off.

A treatment or a rough draft you keep to yourself? I don't see a problem doing so.

[finebydesign]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 5:05pm

I wouldn't start anything without permission. If it is a small-time author, it should be really easy to contact them directly. Otherwise you can go through their publisher with an entertainment lawyer. I would try contact them at first. I have many friends that have been successful with this and I have. You will not always get the answer you want, but access is pretty easy. Many people would be thrilled having their work adapted.

[PatrickDennis92]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 5:13pm

We don't know what author we're dealing with in this scenario. Finebydesign is right in that if it's a small-time author, they likely would be thrilled to get adapted. If it's a famous author, I think Kyle is right in advising you to have a very strong concept and perhaps more before getting in touch.

I think it's great that everyone is giving you such encouragement to go for it, and you absolutely should go for it... but I think we'd be doing a disservice by not warning you that agents can be kind of mean to people they don't know. I hope this one isn't. But just incase they are, I would suggest having work to show when you request permission.

[darquegk]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 5:47pm

I have had a good experience in the past soliciting an author directly for the rights: one of the projects I am currently working on is based on the public-domain film "The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari," albeit heavily reimagined. After seeing the silent film and its dialogue-based 2000s remake, I contacted the director/screenwriter, in order to cover my ass: I didn't want to get sued if I should accidentally utilize elements from his script in my libretto. Much to my surprise, he not only approved and encouraged my project, but sent me the script from his version and told me to do whatever I wanted to it! After a year or two of slow development, almost none of his material is left in the libretto (other than the concept of one of the main characters being mentally ill, a relatively reasonable assumption in the silent film made tangible in the remake), so once the project is done I'll contact David Lee Fisher again, show him the libretto and ask if he wants any form of credit or compensation.

Now, as for what I'm looking at now: the novel in question is "Count Karlstein," a juvenile novel by Philip Pullman, who is a fairly notable author in the fantasy world. Pullman has allowed several of his other minor novels to be adapted, including one as a small avant-garde opera piece. The novel is fascinating for a musical theatre perspective: it has a large cast of characters, several female leads young and old (which, as an in-house writer linked to a small professional company in the Pittsburgh area, is always important to consider), and numerous references and links to "The Black Crook," the fabled first book musical.

Thanks for all of your support! I'm going to write to his literary agent tonight! By the way, if you're at all interested in what I've done so far, you can check out the website for my creative team (still in progress, as we're transitioning from Facebook-only representation to a full homepage) by following my link here.




Official Homepage of Team In Control: Writing New Musical Theatre Updated On: 3/5/13 at 05:47 PM

[Starship]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 7:01pm

I've always wanted to adapt the story of Martin Luther King Jr. into a musical...how hard would it be to get the proper rights to do so?

[darquegk]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 7:20pm

That depends on his estate- a major public figure like King would undoubtedly have an active estate, in the way that someone from A: about fifty years earlier and B: a dubious history, such as Al Capone, would not.

Write to the King estate and explain your desire. That seems, from the advice I was given, to be your best bet.

[Owen22]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 7:56pm

When Maury Yeston was running the BMI Musical Theatre Workshop he always said, don't worry about the rights, just write it!

He knew. He didn't have the rights to 8 1/2 when he originally wrote Nine.

[darquegk]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 8:18pm

I tried that once, with mixed results. For about two years I was very actively involved in writing book, music and lyrics to a musical based on "Beetlejuice." It was more or less finished and I realized that I had no credits to my resume that would make anyone take a chance on me with such an A or B property. So I put it in a folder and sat on it.

Little by little, other projects cannibalized small amounts of my music and lyrics to BJ until almost nothing was left but an adapted libretto and a few songs. If I ever get the go-ahead to proceed with the project, I'll have to rewrite (probably for the better, as I was pretty young) lots of the music and lyrics.

[Starship]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 8:22pm

Like you, darquegk, I have no credits to my resume. Do you think I should still try with the the Martin Luther King Jr. estate?

[Matt Rogers]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 8:47pm

Unless you are just doing an adaptation as a personal experiment that is for your eyes only, I would greatly caution anyone from doing an adaptation without the rights in place. That's just my opinion. However, a wise man once told me that it is easier to get forgiveness than permission, so take that for what it is or is not worth.

[darquegk]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 8:54pm

I have officially applied!

[Starship]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 9:05pm

Would anybody know where I can contact the MLK estate?

[ggersten]

Posted: 3/5/13 at 9:33pm

Starship, there was a musical based on the life of MLK. It was not a success. The Estate apparently guards his reputation very tightly and insists on being very involved, which caused trouble for the musical.
A review of "King"