Decided December 3 1979 Subsequent action(s) none End date 1979 | Citation(s) 603 P.2d 425 Concurrence Mosk Chief judge Rose Bird | |
Full case name Bela George Lugosi, et al., Plaintiffs and Appellants v. Universal Pictures, Defendants and Appellants. Associate Judges Matthew Tobriner, Stanley Mosk, William P. Clark, Jr., Wiley Manuel, Frank K. Richardson, Frank C. Newman Court Supreme Court of California | ||
Lugosi v. Universal Pictures, 603 P.2d 425 (Cal. 1979), was a decision of the Supreme Court of California respecting the personality rights of celebrities, particularly addressing whether these rights descended to the celebrities' heirs. The suit was brought by the heirs of Béla Lugosi, who sued Universal Studios in 1966 for using his personality rights without the heirs' permission. The trial court ruled in favor of the Lugosi heirs, but Universal Studios won the case in an appeal. The court determined that a dead person had no right to his likeness, and any rights that existed did not pass to his heirs.
Contents
History
In September 1930, Béla Lugosi and Universal Pictures Company, Inc. had entered into an agreement for the production of the film Dracula in which Lugosi played the title role under a signed contract. Hope Linninger Lugosi, his widow, and Bela George Lugosi, his son, filed a complaint against Universal on February 3, 1966, alleging that they were the heirs of Béla Lugosi and that Universal had, commencing in 1960, appropriated and continued to appropriate property which they had inherited from Lugosi and which was not part of the agreement with Universal. The Lugosis asserted that from 1960 until the present time, Universal entered into many licensing agreements which authorized the licensees to use the Count Dracula character.
[Lugosi heirs] seek to recover the profits made by [Universal Studios] in its licensing of the use of the Count Dracula character to commercial firms and to enjoin [Universal Studios] from making any additional grants, without [their] consent .... The action, therefore, raises the question of whether Béla Lugosi had granted to [Universal] in his contracts with [Universal] merchandising rights in his movie portrayal of Count Dracula, the nature of such rights, and whether any such rights, if retained by Béla Lugosi, descended to the [Lugosi heirs] ....
Ruling
After eleven years of litigation, the trial judge ruled in favor of the Lugosi heirs, and awarded them $70,000 and barred Universal Studios from merchandising Lugosi's likeness. The decision was appealed and the California Supreme Court ruled that "the right to exploit one's name and likeness is personal to the artist and must be exercised, if at all, by him during his lifetime." The result was a loss for the concept of inheriting personality rights in California.
Aftermath
The California Celebrities Rights Act of 1986 created an inheritable right to a person's name or likeness for 70 years after death. Legislation passed in 2007 extended that right retroactively to all persons who have died since January 1, 1938.