The London-based television production company Celador, which created the game show Who Wants to be a Millionaire?, is considering suing the powerful Hollywood talent agency William Morris for acting improperly in negotiating a deal that brought the hit format onto US screens in 1999.
Celador is flush from victory after winning $269m (£178m) in damages last week from Disney’s ABC network, which airs the US version of Millionaire. After a six-year legal battle, Celador successfully persuaded a Californian jury that it was fiddled out of a fair share of profits from the show, which is still re-run five days a week on coast-to-coast television.
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An original sale of the game show format to Disney was negotiated 11 years ago on Celador’s behalf by William Morris, a huge talent empire which represents clients varying from Prince to Sacha Baron Cohen, Charlotte Church and Wyclef Jean. During courtroom arguments, Disney repeatedly tried to shift any blame for Celador’s treatment onto the talent agency .
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“If Celador Productions is unhappy with the deal they got, they have got the wrong defendant here,” Disney’s lawyer, Marty Katz, told the jury in his closing argument.
Under a legal arrangement known as a “tolling agreement”, Celador and Los Angeles-based William Morris put off any dispute between them until the outcome of the British production firm’s case against Disney. Having won that case, Celador’s founder, Paul Smith, is examining the prospects for action to recoup millions of dollars in fees received by William Morris.
Smith developed the Millionaire‚ concept with three others – radio station director David Briggs and comedy writers Steve Knight and Mike Whitehill. Since its debut hosted by Chris Tarrant on ITV in 1998, the show has become a global phenomenon, airing in more than 100 countries.
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Initially hosted by veteran presenter Regis Philbin, the American version of Millionaire‚ has proved to be among the most lucrative and enduring productions of the game. A jury sided on Wednesday with Celador’s claim that it was entitled to 50% of profits from broadcasts, delivering a windfall to Celador’s founders as well as other former investors in the firm such as the comedian Jasper Carrott.
Giving evidence during Celador’s case against Disney, a former William Morris agent, Greg Lipstone, repeatedly struggled to recollect details of his role in negotiating the mammoth licensing deal. Celador’s US lawyer, Roman Silberfeld, said that until this week’s verdict, Celador had made only $21m in package fees from Millionaire in the US, while William Morris managed to secure $16m.
William Morris declined to comment.
Source: https://t-tees.com
Category: WHO
