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Wheel of Time TV Pilot Producers Sue Robert Jordan's Widow For Defamation
An anonymous reader writes The tale of the late-night Wheel of Time pilot that aired in a paid infomercial slot on FXX has taken another odd turn. Producers Red Eagle Entertainment LLC and Manetheren LLC have filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for central California against Harriet McDougal (widow of James Rigney, who wrote the Wheel of Time novels under the pen name Robert Jordan), her company, Bandersnatch Group Inc., and twenty unnamed other persons ('Does 1-20'). The suit alleges that McDougal's statements about her lack of involvement in the pilot's production constitute breach of contract, slander, and interference with contractual relations and prospective economic relations; the suit demands declaratory relief and a jury trial.
It isn't when you consider that the plaintiff's goals may well have nothing to do with 'recovering damages', insomuch as they're probably doing it to shut her up and at the same time please/placate their investors.
Fuck them and their SCO-spirited kin in either case.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Getting sued for being honest about not doing something is a bit much though, even for USA.
According to the plaintiffs, she was not being honest. There is also the matter that, according to the plaintiffs, she was paid (indirectly through her husband's estate) and contractually bound to keep her mouth shut. I have no idea what "the truth" is, but I don't think it is black and white. If she doesn't want to abide by the terms of the contract, she should at least be compelled to disgorge the money she was paid.
There is also the matter that, according to the plaintiffs, she was paid (indirectly through her husband's estate) and contractually bound to keep her mouth shut.
Contracts don't work indirectly like that. Either you agree to the terms directly or you don't. As all legal organizations including the SCOTUS recognized, a valid contract requires free consent.
Either she was a party to the contract with it's nondisparagement clause, and agreed to keep her mouth shut about all production details, or she was not part of the contract and the company is in the wrong. Her statement was that the show made during her husband's life and with her husband's contract was done "without my knowledge or cooperation," which is quite likely since her then-living husband likely took care of his own business deals.
Some portions of a contract may survive a death and transfer to estates. Others automatically dissolve completely (such as partnership agreements between two people) or require affirmation that the new parties accept the new terms of a new, successor agreement. Binding nondisparagement terms do not transfer to other people.
On its face it looks like the company made an agreement with a now deceased individual. The question is one of contract law. If she signed the contract then she was bound and shouldn't have said anything. But if she didn't sign the agreements, she should be adding a counter-claim.
Can they produce such a contract? Do they have a nondisparagement agreement that SHE signed? That's the key to the entire dispute.
//TODO: Think of witty sig statement
Of course, Sanderson only did books 12, 13 and 14.
IANAL in the USA, but my theory is this.
The contact was probably between Universal Studios and Bandersnatch Group and it included a non-disparagement agreement. From the article here (http://www.tor.com/blogs/2015/02/wheel-of-time-pilot-harriet-statement) it looks like she was speaking in her capacity as the CEO of Bandersnatch Group.
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That TV pilot lacked the requisite balefire from the sky in the prologue of The Eye Of The World. That balefire can be put to good use on Red Eagle Entertainment LLC and Manetheren LLC and erasing them, the pilot, and this lawsuit from the Pattern.