Release clause

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  • Release clause

    Just curious--I was reading the standard "Release" form used by an agency like CAA, and there's a clause about essentially not suing them if a very similar script by someone else ends up getting a deal. How often are there issues around this?

    Reason I ask, there's a local writer who got completely passed over when a studio the writer had a film rights agreement with on a book got taken over by another company. The new people ended up doing a film project based on the writer's book but declined to honor the original company's agreement. The writer pursued a legal case for a time but it was futile.

    I know that's a slightly different situation, but I was just wondering...how often are there issues around this? From the writer's perspective, what are the smart precautions to take?

  • #2
    Re: Release clause

    I don't have an answer to your question but it did remind me of a recent news story about a former CAA lit client who alleges that the agency stole his pilot and gave it to a more successful writer, thus allowing them to make more money off of it via packaging fees.

    https://www.latimes.com/business/hol...328-story.html

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    • #3
      Re: Release clause

      i don't know.

      what i will say, is that i approached a high profile manager/producer with my script and he was at first interested until i sent him the logline, at which time, he told me that he could not read my script because he had just negotiated a sale on a script with a similar concept and sent me the deadline.com announcement. he said it created a conflict of interest and he didn't want one story to have an impact on the other.

      on the subject of the ATA and WGA code of conduct issue, i'm thinking that the big four actually CAN'T agree to the code of conduct issue the WGA wants them to sign, because they'd stand to lose too much money.

      i wouldn't be surprised if we ended up with two different types of agencies, ones that specialize in packaging and those that don't.

      back to the OP... it's a tough call, right? you'd think that they wouldn't take on a client with a similar idea, but then again, two writers could sign with them and a year later the two could have a similar idea. if this happened, i'd hope that something would be communicated with respect to it.

      how do managers negotiate that terrain? i have no clue.
      "Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy b/c you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say." -- Edward Snowden

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      • #4
        !

        Originally posted by Ed Geis View Post
        Just curious--I was reading the standard "Release" form used by an agency like CAA, and there's a clause about essentially not suing them if a very similar script by someone else ends up getting a deal. How often are there issues around this?

        Reason I ask, there's a local writer who got completely passed over when a studio the writer had a film rights agreement with on a book got taken over by another company. The new people ended up doing a film project based on the writer's book but declined to honor the original company's agreement. The writer pursued a legal case for a time but it was futile.

        I know that's a slightly different situation, but I was just wondering...how often are there issues around this? From the writer's perspective, what are the smart precautions to take?
        Apparently, it happens often enough that a clause must be inserted in the release form. There have been instances—in contests, I think I read— where two contest entries had the same premise but the writers were from different coasts. Such is the urban myth, at least, and it does happen.

        A screenplay of mine is of a topic about which someone just wrote a book. The book’s film rights were optioned/sold even before the book has been published. I’m counting on my screenplay premise being wholly different from theirs (I’m certain that it is), and I’m not going to read that book whenever it’s published, either.

        As for your local writer anecdote, unless the book author’s name is a big draw, most studios won’t want the book author to write the screenplay, from all that I’ve read and learned about it. They're “too close” to the material. They’re not screenwriters by trade, either, after all, and may not understand the economy of words required for a screenplay or writing only what a camera can film. In your local writer’s case, there had to have been clauses in the “fine print” of releases and contracts that he/she signed that allowed the first company to hand over the project unencumbered by any previous agreements.

        From the writer’s perspective, the smart precautions to take are to be a fast writer and to get your project out first. For giggles, I have a “Release claws” agreement with my cats.
        Last edited by Clint Hill; 04-08-2019, 06:27 AM.
        “Nothing is what rocks dream about” ― Aristotle

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