Wyrd Sisters take on Warner
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Written by terrypratchettbooks.org
Wednesday, 05 October 2005 |
More on the Wyrd Sisters band saga...
A weird kind of quasi-Canadian punch-up is brewing between a Canadian band and Edgar Bronfman Jr, scion of the Canadian family which made its fortune during the Prohibition era, and who now runs Warner Bros.
We say ‘quasi’ because Bronfman & Co now run the Warner. And Warner is, of course, one quarter - the American quarter - of the multi-national Big Four record label cartel.
It’s also one of the dominant Big Seven movie studios.
“Hi Wyrdos!” – say Canada’s Wyrd Sisters on their web site.
“Things
are...errr... interesting around here. Okay, maybe interesting is not
the right word. Terrifying would be closer. It all started with a phone
call recently from a warner bros lawyer.
“The
fellow said: 'We're making a big movie and putting together a band of
famous musicians together called the wyrd sisters. We're going to make
a big splash, sound tracks the whole shebang! So... you don't want our
army of lawyers shutting down your girls' band... sign this piece of
paper and we'll give you $5000'."
“Hmmmm.
“Here's the way it is.
“We
said no. It is our name. We own it. We're not about to be threatened
into giving up our name. And Warner Bros has no business making a movie
with a band with our name in it without at least some simple courtesy.
“All
kinds of untrue things are circulating about our situation, but I am
unfortunately unable to publicly discuss anything at this point.
Suffice it to say that we didn't go looking for Warner...they came
looking for us.”
But according to the Canadian Press, that's not the end of it.
Wyrd is now suing Warner Bros, not to mention Pulp's Jarvis Cocker, Radiohead's Johnny Greenwood and Phil Selway, over a scene in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire "that allegedly depicts a band called The Wyrd Sisters playing on a stage," says CP.
"The name of the band is threatened by Warner Brothers actions," Wyrd Sisters lawyer Kimberly Townley-Smith is quoted as saying.
"If everybody knows Harry Potter's Wyrd Sisters, we can't go out and find new fans because people are going to see us and go, well who are you? Some people are going to think we're ripping them off."
Oh. So it's all about preserving the Wyrd Sisters name?
Well, not entirely.
"Townley-Smith has filed a statement of claim seeking $40 million plus punitive damages from three divisions of the Warner Brothers empire," says CP.
This is not, however, the first time the Wyrd Sisters' name has been involved in a movie. But the last time it happened, no one got upset and in fact, no one appears to have even mentioned it.
In 1980 Britain's Terry Pratchett wrote a book called theWyrd Sisters, featuring a world carried on four elephants standing on a huge turtle travelling in space. In 1996 it was made into a six-part animated video for Britain's Channel 4 and you can pick up a copy up online for $12 US.
Canada's Wyrd Sisters started out in 1990.
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