As far as the copyright issue, I don't care too much. I would hate for kids to see negative images of their favorite animated characters though.... And I cannot imagine someone calling themselves creative or working in a 'creative' field while riffing on someone else's content. It is derivative and lazy and should not be rewarded.
Have you ever heard the expression "There is nothing new under the sun."?
It's something heard every once in a while in creative circles and is based on the well established idea that there is nothing that is
truly novel in existence. It's the concept that every new idea has some sort of reference point - something it's based on. That all "new" stuff, to put it more bluntly, is a remix of old stuff, life experiences
(also old stuff), and some misfiring synaptics, all mashed together.
Nobody births something truly original from
nothing like the story of the Virgin Mary.
Speaking of which, the original statement that this proverb comes from is:
"and there is no new thing under the sun."
... which has been kicking around a while.
It comes from the book of Ecclesiastes.
In case you're not familiar, that's the bible
- old testament.
The whole line is "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun."
Point is, this idea that new things come from old things has been pretty widely accepted for most of human history, even if you don't agree with it, personally.
This may be a shocking revelation but the whole reason there are art movements - Renaissance, Baroque, Neoclassicism, Romanticisim, Art Nouveau, Impressionism, Surrealism, etc. is because artists
quite famously copy from each other in one way or another.
I have to laugh when I imagine you shouting down Michelangelo, Wolfgang Motzart, Dali... and apparently Walt Disney as all being "derivative and lazy".
BTW,
Here's a cute little book that breaks it down for beginners who want to get in on our racket since this is easially the creative world's worst kept secret.
This may all shatter the romantic view many people who don't work in "creative" fields have of the process but such is life.
Yes, the school's theater department pays for the usage when they purchase the scripts to share out to the actors. That is how it works at that level. Those plays are part of a common pool, and the person that owns the rights to a play gets paid out all the time.
Would you happen to know who currently holds the rights to works by Shakespeare - specifically Romeo and Juliette as I mentioned?
Just curious since they weren't even protected within his own lifetime due to the legal concept of such a thing not existing until centuries after the man's death.
Paying to buy a copy of a script is not at all the same thing as paying for a licenses to perform something, much in the same way that buying a Taylor Swift CD does not entitle the owner to play it in their restaurant for patrons.
If you wanted to preform anything by say, Andrew Lloyd Webber, for instance,
(someone who's work is protected by modern copyright) there is specific licensing required to do that:
Concord Theatricals is the world’s most significant theatrical company, comprising the catalogs of R&H Theatricals, Samuel French, Tams-Witmark and The Andrew Lloyd Webber Collection. We are the only firm providing truly comprehensive services to the creators and producers of plays and musicals...
www.concordtheatricals.com
Simply buying a script or a song book (or checking one out for free from a local library) to read certainty doesn't grant
anyone the legal right to publicly preform it. In fact, the license to preform the Young Actor's Edition of Cats - the one specifically
for high schools - does not include any copies of the script or rental materials.
That's all
extra.
... I would hate for kids to see negative images of their favorite animated characters though.... [
As for this concern, people have been able to do this all along thanks to fair use provisions in US copyright law that allow for parody and non-commercial art so that rat is
long out of the bag with
your favorite mouse.
That example is from the 1970's - probably older than most of the people on these boards. Disney tried
unsuccessfully to sue back then (because they didn't like it but, well, believe it or not, it was actually legal) still, there are plenty of
modern examples, none of which appear to depict the version of Mickey that is about to fall out of copyright yet still will be protected strongly by trademark.
