Actors seek film rights after death
FILMMAKERS are tapping advances in digital technology to resurrect characters after a performer dies.
Rogue One: Star Wars Story – screening in East London this week – features the return of Grand Moff Tarkin, originally played by long-dead actor.
Virtual characters have been used when an actor dies in the middle of a film production, as when Universal Pictures combined computergenerated imagery and previous footage for Paul Walker’s role in 2015’s Furious 7 after Walker’s 2013 death in a car crash.
But Rogue One broke new ground by giving a significant supporting role to a dead star. A digital embodiment of British actor Peter Cushing, who died in 1994, reprised his role from the original 1997 Star Wars film as Tarkin.
Walt Disney Co recreated Tarkin with a mix of visual effects and a different actor.
The trend has sent Hollywood actors in the here-and-now scrambling to exert control over how their characters and images are portrayed in the hereafter.
“Celebrities are increasingly involved in making plans to protect a
Atheir intellectual property rights,” said Mark Roesler, an attorney and chairman of CMG Worldwide, an agency representing celebrity estates. “They understand that their legacy will continue beyond their lifetime.”
Robin Williams, who committed suicide in 2014, banned any use of his image for commercial means until 2039, according to court documents.
He also blocked anyone from digitally inserting him into a movie or TV scene or using a hologram, as was done with rapper Tupac Shakur at Southern California’s Coachella music festival in 2012 – 16 years after his murder.
Roesler said at least 25 of his clients are engaged in actively negotiating the use of their or their loved ones’ computerimages in movies, television or commercials.
Some actors or heirs worry that overexposure will tarnish a celebrity’s image, he said. Some explicitly rule out posthumous depictions involving sex or violence, while others focused on drugs or alcohol.
California law already gives heirs control over actors’ posthumous profits by requiring their permission for any use of their likeness.
A Disney spokeswoman declined to comment on whether Princess Leia would appear in films beyond Episode VIII, set for release in 2017. Carrie Fisher, who died of a heart attack two days after Christmas, had already wrapped filming for the next Star Wars episode.
Fisher had been expected to play a key role in the ninth instalment of the sci-fi saga, due for release in 2019.
Fisher’s attorney, Frederick Bimbler, did not return requests for information on any stipulations the actress may have made about use of her image.
Disney would need to negotiate “re-use fees” with Fisher’s estate to resurrect her character for future films, said Mark Litwak, an entertainment attorney in Los Angeles.
The rights of actors’ heirs are rooted in a 1985 California law requiring filmmakers to obtain permission from a celebrity’s estate to use his or her image after death. The law was enacted after a campaign by the son of Dracula actor Bela Lugosi, a lawyer who objected to widespread use of his late father’s image. — Reuters