‘SHOW’ ME $2M
Bobby Brown sues Showtime over Whitney film
Count him out.
Bobby Brown is suing Showtime for more than $2 million for airing footage he says he didn’t give the company permission to use.
“Whitney: Can I Be Me” — the 2017 documentary about Brown’s ex-wife, legendary per former Whitney Housto — features more than 3 minutes of unauthorize footage of him and their la daughter Bobbi Kristina Brown, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday.
Brown, 49, claims he and his daughter never signed consent forms authorizing use of the video, which, according to the lawsuit, was filmed prior to his 2007 divorce with Houston.
Bobbi Kristina is listed as a plaintiff through her estate.
dition to , many others in the film never signed releases for their images to be in (it),” Brown claims in the suit, which was filed in Manhattan Federal Court.
He contends he never signed releases for three of his other children, who were minors at the time, to be in the film, either, and also claims that since the film’s credits include his company, Brownhouse Entertainment, its producers were suggesting they had his blessing.
Brown’s wife Whitney Houston died at 48 of an accidental drowning linked to her cocaine use in 2012. Bobbi Kristina died three years later under similar circumstances at the age of 22. She was discovered unresponsive in a bathtub on Jan. 31, 2015, and died in July of that year after spending months in a coma.
Brown’s lawsuit also names Passion Pictures, B2 Entertainment and the British Broadcasting Corp. as defendants, and claims the BBC is airing the “alleged documentary” in England.
“Can I Be Me” was written, co-produced and co-directed by well-known English filmmaker Nick Bloomfield, whose past documentary subjects include Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love, Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur, serial killer Aileen Wournos and Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss.
Brown is seeking a restraining order against Showtime, BBC and the other defendants to prevent them from marketing, promoting and distributing the film.
Spokesmen for both Showtime and the BBC declined comment.