Lawyers for one Andrew Ainsworth will be in court today to argue over copyrights to the Star Wars Imperial Stromtroopers' armor.
It turns out that Ainsworth created the mold from which the armor was cast for the original Star Wars film. He sold the helmets to George Lucas for right around $75, originally. In 2004, Ainsworth discovered one of the original helmets in a cabinet in his design studio. After selling it to a collector for an insane amount of cash, he began manufacturing the suits once again to sell to collectors. Lucasfilm responded last year by suing him in America for copyright infringement, unfair competition, and trademark infringement, winning $20 million.
Now the case is set to be heard across The Pond, as Ainsworth's lawyers prepare to argue that the costumes were pieces of industrial design and not works of art, thus an implied contract existed. However, Ainsworth did not draft the original designs for the costumes; an artist friend of his, Ralph McQuarrie, did.
The case could have long-reaching implications for all sorts of entertainment law issues, including international trademark and copyright infringement, and - the crux of the matter - whether or not special FX and costuming props in movies are works of art or industrial design. This could be especially important, since Ainsworth also manufactured one face-sucking creepy-crawly for the classic sci-fi franchise, Aliens.
© C Harris Lynn, 2008
A rambling melange of pop-culture.
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