Kids, be warned. Before you take your Super-8 camera out into the woods with your mates for a little bit of spooky film action fun pay heed to the legal action that Artisan, the production company behind The Blair Witch Project, now finds itself embroiled in. For the second time in as many weeks the company, which made $140m from last year's sleeper, is taking action against a company for reneging on its licence fees. Artisan is suing the United Artists Theatre Circuit, alleging that the chain failed to pay $3.1m in ticket receipts during the horror hit's summer run.
The lawsuit says United Artists agreed to pay 90 percent of the gross ticket receipts and to faithfully report the price charged for admission and the total number of tickets sold. The chain "failed and refused, and continues to fail and refuse, to make full payment of the licence fee due and owing to Artisan," according to the suit. The company has also begun similar action against Regal Cinemas for almost $6m in damages, alleging the same failure to pay licence fees.
But the litigious company has also found itself on the receiving end of legal action. Former Blair Witch Project partner, Sam Barber, has been told he can now proceed with his claim that he was deprived of an executive producer credit on the film. A US district court judge has refused to grant a motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by Artisan Entertainment and other defendants. In denying the motion, the judge ruled that Barber could proceed with his claim that the failure to include his credit was unfair competition in violation of federal law.
Barber originally filed his suit before the release of the film in 1996, alleging he developed the Blair Witch idea with Daniel Myrick, who is credited as co-writer and co-director on the film. Barber claims he spent thousands of dollars on developing the film, preparing the treatment and shooting the trailer, believing that he, Myrick and the other co-writer, Gregg Hale, would all eventually become partners. Instead, he alleges, they took the project away from his company and isolated him from the rest of the movie.
