Parody Entitled To Copyright Protection

Playwright Jamie Keeling, who scripted a parody stage adaptation of the 1991 film Point Break, is suing the production company that fired her and staged their own version of the play, saying Keeling had no right to her script because it was a parody. The question was whether someone who creates a parody may sue someone else who is also doing a parody. A jury in December 2012 said yes, and ruled in favor of Keeling. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals agreed. Judge Jose Cabranes wrote that Keeling created, “jokes, props, exaggerated staging, and humorous theatrical devices to transform the dramatic plot and dialogue of the film into an irreverent, interactive theater experience…. It is not the invocation of fair use that provides the work copyright protection. It is the originality of the derivative work that makes it protectable.”