The case against Stereophonic

[Joey Ledenio]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 11:32am

Having read the lawsuit against David Adjmi over Stereophonic being a work of plagiarism, and knowing someone who works at Playwrights Horizons and helped oversee the rewrite process for the show, I think there's a scarily credible case against David. There are a LOT of similarities between the Fleetwood Mac memoir and his play (with some passages lifted verbatim). I think it only hurts David that he's already been sued for copying Three's Company which he won only because he called it a parody, and with this he's definitely denied parodying the memoir while also admitting to reading it. Wonder if this will be a case of sharing royalties or if a bigger fallout a la "Blurred Lines" 

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 11:55am

I think there's no question that this gets settled, probably in the form of revenue-sharing and an option payment. Maybe even a "suggested by the book" credit on future productions. Adjmi has admitted to reading (and liking) the book and there are clear similarities in the story arc, some plot beats, and even some lines.

None of that changes the fact that Stereophonic is a great play.

The only surprise is that the lawsuit took this long, being that people have been making the Fleetwood Mac comparison since it was at PH. But as Michael Schulman said in his NEW YORKER piece, the book author/engineer had never seen a Broadway show before and is based on the other coast.

The list of defendants is kind of funny because it's clear that the Plaintiffs' lawyers have no understanding of how a Broadway producing LLC actually works (and seemingly a lack of understanding in how Broadway economics work), but that part will be easily resolved.

I'm not a lawyer, but if Caillat wins this, could there also be a life-rights case against the play by members of Fleetwood Mac who are fictionalized in the play?

Updated On: 10/2/24 at 11:55 AM

[PipingHotPiccolo]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 12:34pm

No idea what a life rights case would look like--- Fleetwood Mac are very much public figures, and their work product (ie songs, writings) are not being used. 

I also am not sure where the law lands re biographical works. Could Hamilton sue LMM if he were alive? Chernow worked with LMM, sure, but if he hadnt, and LMM compiled Hamilton using history books--the very purpose of which are to teach/communicate historical facts-- im not sure how far that lawsuit would go so long as the work stuck to the historical narrative.

Maybe Adjmi lifted whole sections of dialogue from these guys, in which case, yikes, but if you write a narrative tale about Fleetwood Mac, im not sure why someone else can use that history in his or her own artistic fashion. Not my area of the law, though.

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 12:54pm

This falls under the same scenario as The Supremes and DREAMGIRLS. There are enormous similarities to their career story from starting off as a sister/background act to The Primes (later The Temptations), to Florence Ballard (Effie White) being the group’s original lead singer being pushed into background singer status as Deena Jones (Diana Ross) is moved to lead spot to market the group to the pop music market. Then there’s the Diana Ross/Berry Gordy (Deena/Curtis) romance. Lots of other similarities as well. 

[Kad]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 1:06pm

BrodyFosse123 said: "This falls under the same scenario as The Supremes and DREAMGIRLS. There are enormous similarities to their career story from starting off as a sister/background act to The Primes (later The Temptations), to Florence Ballard (Effie White) being the group’s original lead singer being pushed into background singer status as Deena Jones (Diana Ross) is moved to lead spot to market the group to the pop music market. Then there’s the Diana Ross/Berry Gordy (Deena/Curtis) romance. Lots of other similarities as well."

There is a major difference here in that there was not one specific source that Dreamgirls drew from or that anyone claimed it drew from. The allegation here is that Adjmi used Ken Caillat's book as the primary source and adapted it, lifting details, scenarios, and even dialogue. Looking at some of the comparisons between Caillat's book and the Stereophonic script in the lawsuit, there does appear to be some similarity if not outright paraphrasing or slight rewording of specific quotes.

Updated On: 10/2/24 at 01:06 PM

[JSquared2]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 1:08pm

BrodyFosse123 said: "This falls under the same scenario as The Supremes and DREAMGIRLS. There are enormous similarities to their career story from starting off as a sister/background act to The Primes (later The Temptations), to Florence Ballard (Effie White) being the group’s original lead singer being pushed into background singer status as Deena Jones (Diana Ross) is moved to lead spot to market the group to the pop music market. Then there’s the Diana Ross/Berry Gordy (Deena/Curtis) romance. Lots of other similarities as well."

Not the same scenario at all.  In the case of STEREOPHONIC, Adjmi has lifted certain dialogue and other specific details verbatim from Caillat's book.  No way the show wants this going to trial -- a settlement will be made (and I'm amazed it took this long for the lawsuit to be filed).

 

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 1:11pm

The key difference with DREAMGIRLS is it's not cribbing from published source material like STEREO.

It reminds me a little bit of the Oscar for Adapted Screenplay vs Original Screenplay categories:

MAESTRO, SPOTLIGHT, TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO SEVEN, GREEN BOOK, and THE KING'S SPEECH can be considered "Original" Screenplays, because even though they're based off real-life people, events, news reports, and anecdotes (and in some cases happened in conjunction with the estates), they're not based on one specific published work. As opposed to something like LINCOLN or HIDDEN FIGURES, which were adapted from books.

Updated On: 10/2/24 at 01:11 PM

[Kad]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 1:12pm

Frankly, after what happened with 3C - which, to be clear here, was a cut and dry fair-use case and was rightfully settled in Adjmi's favor- I am surprised that there wasn't more due diligence taken to make Stereophonic squeaky clean legally.

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 1:38pm

This is kinda drifting from the subject at hand, but a lot of rightsholders really hate parody, because though it's fully legal, they have no control over it.

Like imagine if Disney had been in the process of adapting James Cameron's TITANIC into a stage musical, or if Celine Dion and her reps had been working on a catalogue musical about her life? Both those things might have less value for the stage now that TITANIQUE exists and is showing no signs of stopping. I can't imagine any of those parties are thrilled with the show.

A sanctioned bio-play or bio-pic of MAKING RUMOURS might have stood to make more money for Ken Caillat and Steve Stiefel (and the band if the songs were used) due to the ability to advertise Fleetwood Mac. But it probably wouldn't have been better than STEREO.

Updated On: 10/2/24 at 01:38 PM

[KevinKlawitter]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 2:29pm

ErmengardeStopSniveling said: "The key difference with DREAMGIRLS is it's not cribbing from published source material like STEREO.

It reminds me a little bit of the Oscar for Adapted Screenplay vs Original Screenplay categories:

MAESTRO, SPOTLIGHT, TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO SEVEN, GREEN BOOK, and THE KING'S SPEECHcan be considered "Original" Screenplays, because even though they'rebased off real-life people, events, news reports, and anecdotes (and in some cases happened in conjunction with the estates), they're notbased on one specific published work.As opposed to something like LINCOLN or HIDDEN FIGURES, which were adapted frombooks."

Well, strictly speaking THE KING'S SPEECH was adapted from a play, it's just that the play hadn't been produced yet so the Academy still considered it original. There's a long history of iffy categorization in writing submissions, such as WHIPLASH being considered adapted because of the proof-of-concept short film being screened at festivals or this year EMILIA PEREZ being submitted by Netflix in Original despite the movie being explicitly based on Boris Razon's 2018 novel Écoute.

[BorisTomashevsky]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 2:58pm

This is all a real shame. Kinda taints the entire last year or so of the raging success the play has had. Obviously most audience members won't know or really care, but morale in the producing office and backstage must be a bit down.

[Jay Lerner-Z]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 3:12pm

"Aline” is even better than Titanique.

Legal scholars, why did that need to change names?

 

[ddenoff2]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 5:03pm

I’m also going to look at the statue of limitations on these claims given it took so long for the suit to be filed…obviously waiting until there was a successful production to sue but perhaps being filed just under the wire

 

[verywellthensigh]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 5:05pm

Oh, Adjmi.

All you had to do was dream. 

[TheatreMonkey]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 5:23pm

Would love for HogansHero to chime in with his always astute analysis of the legal situation! 

[Kad]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 5:25pm

Jay Lerner-Z said: ""Aline” is even better than Titanique.

Legal scholars, why did that need to change names?"

I think this is operating under the same legal principles as Dreamgirls and the Supremes. They don’t have the rights to tell the story of Celine Dion, so it’s fictionalized while still being recognizably that story.  

But to be clear here: this lawsuit is not about Stereophonic being about Fleetwood Mac. The lawsuit is about whether Stereophonic is an unauthorized adaptation of Caillat’s book, which is a different matter.  

[berniesb!tch]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 5:47pm

I skimmed the legal doc at work....yeah I mean that click track section doesn't make things look great for Adjmi. It was pretty identical. I love the show and I am not smart enough to know the ins and outs of things like this but this case seems like it could be kind of legitimate.

[CoffeeBreak]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 5:55pm

This will get fixed quickly.   The people using AI however for "writing" will be in a for a surprise.   The inputs from humans are all being recorded, saved etc.  The AI companies are already starting to sue "writers" (book, music or lyric) for "work" created by AI.  Best to use own brain.

[GottaGetAGimmick420]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 6:43pm

TheatreMonkey said: "Would love for HogansHero to chime in with his always astute analysis of the legal situation!"

I need that guy that writes for theatre stuff for Forbes to explain this one to me

[Blindbutlerdeafmaid]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 8:27pm

So, a couple of thoughts in reaction to the thread: 

• Caillet's book would have been a copyrighted work: a fixed, tangible creative expression. Presumably it's history that he has gotten permission to tell, perhaps some of it is his own fabrication, perhaps most of it lives somewhere in between (his recollection of events he was a participant in that has been embellished or... whatever). Regardless of the truths (that's between him and the book's subjects), his book is a copyrighted work. Using any aspect of it, requires his permission. 
• It is important for authors like Caillet to get the suite of rights that we commonly refer to as "life rights" that would allow them to survive invasion of privacy, defamation, or any other potential claims. A person's right of publicity allows them to prevent the unauthorized commercial use of their name, likeness, and other recognizable aspects of their life, as nearly ever state recognizes a person's "right of publicity".
• If the book didn't exist Adjmi may still have had a "right of publicity" suit from the people depicted as it's so identifiably them. 
• I don't know the history of Dreamgirls on the legal level to know if there was ever "right of publicity" issues with the show. However, since it wasn't based on a copyrightable work, it didn't infringe on something that someone personally affixed into a tangible medium before. 
• This won't get settled easily. If you can prove that there was willful infringement (regardless of Adjmi's press quotes), the damages can be six figures and other recourses like Caillet is seeking. Authors of copyrightable works have the absolute right to approve derivative works (unless they license or sell that right away). It would be VERY hard for Adjmi to defend himself against claims that he recklessly disregarded the possibility that he was violating copyright law by just changing the names of the characters. 
• Almost ALL infringement cases get filed after there is some sort of commercial exploitation of the infringing work. At that point there is provable damage to the original work. There is essentially no functional statute of limitations for copyright infringement, but it's an evolving and complicated area of copyright law that takes a lot of reading. There's no way to distill it to something digestable here. 
• This suit would undeniably be the product of a breakdown in settlement negotiations. There is almost no reason to jump from discovering your work has been infringed upon to a suit. It could be a tactic or the play could really interfere with Callait's plans for his own work and it's not about the money. Either way: it's well within his rights as the author of a copyrighted work. 
• Parody is wholly misunderstood and much more limited that most people realize. Just because you want to do something funny with someone's copyrighted work doesn't mean you can do so. Weird Al had to get permission for every song he wanted to record. The stories are legendary. The author of a musical about a major life event that women endure either lost her battle or settled with the catalog owners of the songs in her show. It cost her millions at the point it was brought because she wasn't using the songs to parody the singers, the authors, or politicians and the show had been out a while. Many of these "parody" shows actually do have relationships with the studios who control the movies they parody because some elements may be parody and some may just be infringement and the fight over it is more expensive than the royalty relationship.

Obviously this is not legal advice. Copyright/parody/subsidiary rights/infringement is not an area of law that you want to wander into as a creator without proper legal counsel who knows the specifics of what you're trying to do. It gets messy and expensive REALLY fast.

Updated On: 10/2/24 at 08:27 PM

[BoringBoredBoard40]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 8:38pm

Blindbutlerdeafmaid said: "So, a couple of thoughts in reaction to the thread:

• Parody is wholly misunderstood and much more limited that most people realize. Just because you want to do something funny with someone's copyrighted work doesn't mean you can do so. Weird Al had to get permission for every song he wanted to record. The stories are legendary. The author of a musical about a major life event that women endure either lost her battle or settledwith the catalog owners of the songs in her show. It cost her millions at the point it was brought because she wasn't using the songs to parody the singers, the authors, or politicians and the show had been out a while. Many of these "parody" shows actually do have relationships with the studios who control the movies they parody because some elements may be parody and some may just be infringement and the fight over it is more expensive than the royalty relationship.

Obviously this is not legal advice. Copyright/parody/subsidiary rights/infringementis not an area of law that you want to wander into as a creator without proper legal counsel who knows the specifics of what you're trying to do. It gets messy and expensive REALLY fast."

So much incorrect information here.

 

First of all Weird Al didn't need permission to do his parodies, the reason he asked permission from the artists is because he is a good guy who didn't want to step on people's toes and it so endeared him to the industry in the process to the point it became an HONOR to have your song parodied by him because it meant your song was culturally significant. He has stated this on the record dozens of times that he doesn't need permission but will only do it if the artist is cool with it.

Secondly, almost none of these parody shows have studio involvement, studios are HIGHLY protective of their IP and they stand to make way more money producing an actual stage version of Friends of The Office or Saw then essentially a water-downed rip-off, the reason they don't is because these would be stupid ideas

[GilmoreGirlO2]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 9:49pm

Reading the legal doc, it’s quite clear that Adjmi outright copied the book. What boggles my mind are the things Admji added to his script (the houseboat wars, the Tony Orlando reference) that are so specific and unnecessary to have added in his script - things that could not possibly be coincidental unless he was using “Making Rumors” as his source material.

Seeing how blatantly the script follows the viewpoint, arcs, “characters,” and literal dialogue from “Making Rumors,” I don’t understand how no producers or anyone on the creative team (or Will Butler or any of the actors, for that matter) of “Stereophonic” didn’t flag this as cause for concern as they were putting the show up. Surely there were others on the team that read “Making Rumors,” either before working on this show or during.

I also don’t think Adjmi is helping his case by saying things like everything came from “his imagination.” With how closely the script mirrors both Fleetwood Mac themselves and the perspective depicted in “Making Rumors,” trying to claim he made everything up just smacks of a blatant lie (or, if Adjmi truly believes this, pure delusion).

It will be interesting to see what happens.

 

[BorisTomashevsky]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 10:32pm

Maybe it’s time to return that Tony Award. 

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 11:18pm

BorisTomashevsky said: "Maybe it’s time to return that Tony Award."

Get a grip.

Whether it's a work of adaptation or something entirely from his head, that doesn't change that it's a great play –– and immaculately mounted by Daniel Aukin, Playwrights Horizons, and the cast –– and a unique Broadway success story.

Anyone with even the slightest knowledge of Fleetwood Mac knew what Adjmi was doing here (including those who voted on said Tony Award).

Jesse Green even dedicated two paragraphs to the comparisons in his [rave] review:

If you know anything about the year Fleetwood Mac spent making the 1977 album “Rumours,” you will grasp the template at once, even though Adjmi has said he was inspired by many bands of the era after listening to Led Zeppelin on a flight to Boston.

Nevertheless, the bones are Fleetwood Mac’s. Like Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham, the play’s Diana and Peter are an American couple, she on vocals, he on vocals and guitar. Like John and Christine McVie, the fictional Reg and Holly are British, he on bass guitar, she on keyboard and vocals. And like Mick Fleetwood himself, Simon is the drummer, playing Daddy to the others while missing his wife and actual children back home.

[JSquared2]

Posted: 10/2/24 at 11:19pm

It’s only a matter of time before we have a David Adjmi/Jeff Marx collaboration.