Disney and Lucasfilm are being sued in the UK for computer-generated resurrection of dead actors for use in new films. In this specific case, a friend of Peter Cushing, filmmaker Kevin Francis and his company “Tyburn Film Productions” took the companies to court because they digitally portrayed Cushing as Grand Moff Tarkin in the Star Wars film “Rogue One”, although the actor had previously spoken out against his own portrayal using special effects.
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Peter Cushing played Admiral Tarkin in the first Star Wars film in 1977 and died of prostate cancer in 1994 at age 81. The character was recast in the 2016 film “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.” Another actor (Guy Henry) stepped in, whose face was later digitally altered to look more like Peter Cushing as the original Grand Moff.
Plaintiff points to Cushing’s denials
Cushing’s friend Francis claims this was illegal and has sued the makers of Rogue One, as have the Londoners The Times report. According to lawyers representing the Tyburn Film Company and Francis, Cushing had previously objected to such use in 1993 when another TV movie came up for production. That project fell through, but the agreement with Cushing would apply to other films as well, so Star Wars producers would not be allowed to feature Cushing in Rogue One.
Lucasfilm and the company “Lunak Heavy Industries”, which co-produced the original trilogy, had illegally enriched themselves through Cushing’s participation. But Lucasfilm and Lunak said they had not violated these contract terms by digitally using the actor. Disney and Lucasfilm own the rights to Cushing’s Tarkin, part of the rights to the original Star Wars films. In addition, the producers paid about 33,000 euros to his estate for the use of Cushing’s appearance, Euronews report,
The suit was accepted, the verdict is still pending
So far, the initial issue in London has been whether to allow the lawsuit against Disney & Co. Lucasfilm and Lunac wanted to dismiss the case in December last year, but were rejected in court. The production companies had filed a lawsuit against it again, but this week British Supreme Court judge Tom Mitcheson allowed the proceedings to go to court.
However, Mitcheson doesn’t see any particularly strong arguments on either side. The judge is “not convinced” that Francis will win the case, but he is also “not convinced” that the case is watertight to the extent necessary to grant summary judgment or dismiss the suit, as claimed by production companies Lucasfilm and Lunac. “In an area where the law is evolving, it is very difficult to determine where the boundaries are without a full factual investigation,” Mitcheson said.
Filmmaking may soon undergo significant changes, especially due to the increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI), which will lead to losses for actors and Hollywood writers. The latter went on a writers’ strike in 2023, but it ended due to AI concessions. The next step will be to replace humans with AI in filmmaking, as Hollywood’s Ashton Kutcher has suggested. It is cheaper than hiring writers, actors and visual effects artists.
(FDS)
