- [Narrator] Thanks to Dashlane for keeping Legal Eagle in the air. - So you don't work on
a contingency basis? - No, money down. Oops shouldn't have this Bar
Association logo here either. (tearing)
(chewing) - Yeah, he's just the best
worst lawyer of all time. (playful music) Hey Legal Eagles, it's time
to think like a lawyer, and today we are covering
one of my favorite episodes of one of my favorite series of all time, it's The Simpsons and it's
episode where Itchy and Scratchy get taken to court for
copyright infringement. It's called The Day the Violence Died, and while I will be reacting to it, I think I could probably quote
this episode line for line, it's really that good,
it's one of my favorites, it involves Lionel Hutz. - [Lionel] No, money down. - It's just, it's just, it's fantastic. So as always, be sure to comment
in the form of an objection which I will either sustain or overrule, and stick around until
the end of the episode where I give The Simpsons,
The Day the Violence Died a grade for legal realism. So without further ado, let's dig in to The Simpsons, The
Day the Violence Died. (playful music) So the background of this episode is that it is the 75th anniversary
of Itchy & Scratchy, which is a clear stand-in for Disney, a much more violent version of
the Walt Disney Corporation, and the town of Springfield
is throwing a parade for the creators of Itchy & Scratchy, which includes Roger Meyers Senior, who is the guy who claims to
have invented Itchy & Scratchy. The parade goes into Bumtown, where we find Bart about to meet a bum who claims to have invented
Itchy & Scratchy himself. (upbeat music) - Hey, wait up! (tomatoes splattering) (blows raspberries) - Get out of Bumtown, you no talent bum. - Bums.
- Show some respect, man, that no talent created Itchy & Scratchy. - He didn't create Itchy, I did. - Huh? - He stole the character from me in 1928. When I complained, his thugs
kicked me out of his office and dropped an anvil on me. (laughs) - So this is interesting, this
is a normal copyright issue, great issues going on already. Here you have the theft
of intellectual property, and purportedly, the theft of a character. Now a character as a part
from a normal literary or audiovisual work can actually
receive copyright protection. So for example we've seen
many times in litigation that James Bond has copyright
protection as a character apart from all of the 30
or 40 James Bond movies that that character has appeared in. So it is possible to quote
unquote steal a character from a copyright
perspective, but remember, you cannot steal ideas. Ideas are not copyrightable,
it's only the expression itself and I think that's going to be a big theme throughout this episode. - You invented Itchy, the
Itchy & Scratchy Itchy? - Sure, in fact, I
invented the whole concept of cartoon violence. Before I came along,
all cartoon animals did was play the ukulele, I changed all that. - Well, I'm not calling you a liar but, but I can't think of a way
to finish that sentence. (laughs) - Here we have another argument, which is that he invented
the idea of cartoon violence. Now that almost certainly
he would not be able to have copyright protection over. The idea of cartoon
violence or the idea of a romantic comedy or the
idea of a sci-fi space opera, these are what we call scenes a faire, which are not protectable. They are stock scenes that
we see over and over and over again in many different industries and different types of IP, so he would not be able to have claim for intellectual property over
the idea of cartoon violence, even if cartoon characters were only just playing the ukulele
before he came along. - Itchy the Lucky Mouse
in Manhattan Madness. - That's the first
Itchy cartoon ever made, and it was made by me,
Chester J. Lampwick. Find me a 90-year-old projector
and I'll prove it to you. (playful music) - (laughs) They go to the school. (light piano music) Okay so right off the
bat, this film canister contains the film of the original
Itchy & Scratchy cartoon. The thing is, that is something that lends itself to a valid copyright. The thing about copyright is that you can't have to petition
the government to get it. There are reasons why you
would want to do that, but as soon as you put your
expression into a tangible form that's supposed to be
semi-permanent or permanent, that is when you get the
copyright in the expression, and this film reel is
going to be something that could lend itself
to creating a copyright in this film itself and in the character of Itchy and/or Scratchy. (kids laugh) The concept of cartoon violence invented. - [Bart] All right Chester! (cheering) - [Millhouse] Way to go! - Oh, so this is a great
little tidbit here. It says copyright, that
little C in the circle, 1919. In 1919, you actually had
to put a copyright notice on any work that you had. If you didn't put a copyright notice on your tangible expression, then you would not get a copyright. So back in the day, it was
really, really important to have that little symbol
to let everyone know that this was a copyrighted work. So if Chester J. Lampwick
had not put that notice on his film, he would not have a copyright and he wouldn't have any claim to the Itchy & Scratchy fortune. United States did away
with that requirement in 1976 in the 1976 Copyright Act, which really wasn't necessary at all. It was a trap for the
unwary to not include a copyright notice in
your actual expression, so now you still get a copyright regardless of whether you put the little C with the date that says
that there's a copyright on your particular work. - That was Itchy all
right, you did invent him. When people see this,
you'll be rich and famous! (tape crinkles) (laughs) (dramatic music) D'oh. - Yeah, as an evidentiary issue, that makes it much, much
harder to prove your case. - Well, that brought
back a lot of memories. - I Can't Believe It's
a Law Firm. (laughs) Okay, there are actual regulations that prescribe what
lawyers are allowed to put in terms of a name of their firms, and that name absolutely
does not comply with that, and it sort of implies that
it's not actually a law firm. Although a query whether Lionel
Hutz is actually an attorney in The Simpsons, given
his run-ins with the Bar. Oh, Lionel Hutz is my
favorite character ever, he's so good. - All right gentlemen,
I'll take your case, but I'm going to have to
ask for a $1,000 retainer. - A thousand dollars? But your ad says no money down. - Oh, they got this all screwed up. (pen squeaking) (laughs) - As I've covered already on this channel, this is one of my favorite
lawyer jokes of all time, and it so plays into Lionel Hutz as being the most ridiculous,
terrible lawyer of all time. This is such a clear
violation of legal ethics, where you can't put out an
ad like that to the public and then completely redline it right in front of your potential client and claim that you only work
with a retainer and money down, but the way that it works is
just so perfect, it's so good. - So you don't work on
a contingency basis? - No, money down. Oops, shouldn't have this Bar
Association logo here either. (tearing)
(chewing) - Yeah, he's just the best
worst lawyer of all time. - I thought I recognized you. I gave you a plate of
corn muffins back in 1947 to paint my chicken coop,
and you never did it. - Those corn muffins were lousy. - Paint my chicken coop. - Make me. (fists thudding) - Yeah, that would be a
totally enforceable contract, corn muffins for painting
the chicken coop, and Chester J. Lampwick
would be in violation of that contract for not
actually providing his labor. I think the statute of
limitations has probably run there now that it's 80
years in the future, but it would have been
an enforceable contract. - Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, there's an easy way to get rid of Chester without the guilt of sending
him back to the gutter. And all it will cost you
is a thousand dollars. (playful music) (laughs) - Got legal fees from some family. Okay, quick note, it
is possible to bankroll someone else's lawsuit. Now traditionally, historically
that has been illegal, it's been what's called champerty, and that's been a
violation of legal ethics. Those rules have largely been removed, and it is possible to bankroll
someone else's lawsuit. This actually happened very recently when Peter Thiel, the tech billionaire, financed Hulk Hogan's lawsuit
against Gawker the website for publishing Hulk Hogan's sex tape. This is a part of a great
book by Ryan Holiday called Conspiracy, that
talks about Peter Thiel wanting to get revenge against Gawker, so he bankrolled this
lawsuit that eventually bankrupted the Gawker media enterprise. So it is possible to do, it is legal, might not be the nicest thing to do, but you are allowed to do it. (tense music) - Exhibit A, Stable Itchy, dated 1928, the very first Itchy & Scratchy cartoon, and the credits clearly state written, directed, and
created by Roger Myers. Music by Roger Myers and George Gershwin, produced by Roger Myers
and Joseph P. Kennedy, copyright 1928 by Roger Myers. - So we've already talked
about how important that copyright notice was. I don't know why they are jumping right to closing argument here,
there would normally be years of discovery and motions on paper. This is the sort of thing
that would be dealt with on summary judgment because
there is no evidence on behalf of Chester J. Lampwick, but as with most fictional
portrayals of legal proceedings, they're just getting
right to the juicy parts. - You will also notice Mr. Myers's name and copyright notice on
the original drawings of the other members of the
Itchy & Scratchy family, Brown-Nose Bear, Disgruntled Goat, Flatulent Fox, Rich Uncle
Skeleton, and Dinner Dog. - My client's film predates all
of those things, your Honor. - You can't argue in the
middle of a statement. - Oh yes, I've forgotten, your famous film, the one you
destroyed before the trial and haven't been able to
able to find another copy of. Oh yes, that film. - Yes, you don't have a copy, do you? (laughing) - Now that sounds ridiculous,
and it is ridiculous in the middle of trial like that, but in real life, Lionel Hutz
would have been able to ask if the owners of Itchy & Scratchy have old copies of the 1919 film that is the basis for his claim. And if they did, they would be
obligated to turn that over. Now you might think that's crazy, why would you turn over negative
evidence against yourself? Well the rules of civil
discovery require you to turn it over because we
don't want trial by ambush, we want everyone to put all
of their cards on the table, and if there's evidence that you have that's bad for your case, you have a duty to turn that over to the other side if you get to that part
of the discovery process. So Lionel Hutz, you know,
he's a terrible lawyer, but even a blind squirrel
finds a nut sometimes. - [Nelson] Ha ha! - So uh, good job for him. - Roger Myers didn't create
any of his characters, he stole them all. (dramatic music)
(crowd murmurs) The only characters Myers
could ever come up with were pathetic stick figures with the words Sarcastic Horse and Manic
Mailman printed on them. And they stank. - So who is the voice
of Chester J. Lampwick? That sounds really, hold on a second, I need to look this up because that guy sounds really familiar. (dinging) (gasps) It's Kirk Douglas. Oh, I didn't know that, that's fantastic. - Mr. Hutz, we've been
in here for four hours. Do you have any evidence at all? - Well your Honor, we've
got plenty of hearsay and conjecture, those
are kinds of evidence. (laughs) That's actually true,
hearsay and conjecture are kinds of evidence. They're not good forms of evidence, but technically they
are types of evidence. Many of the lawyers that
I know use that line all the time, it's a staple
among lawyers, it's fantastic. (dramatic music) - I knew I had seen this
exact scene somewhere else. It was in the movie
Mr. Lampwick showed me. Ladies and gentlemen, this
drawing was made in 1919, nine years before Roger
Myers made his first Itchy & Scratchy cartoon. - Hmm, yeah, but how do we
know that that's authentic? There's a whole authentication process that you have to go through to prove that the evidence that you are putting forward is what it purports to be. I don't think this evidence would be admissible at this point. - Okay, maybe my dad did
steal Itchy, but so what? Animation is built on plagiarism. If it weren't for someone
plagiarizing the Honeymooners, we wouldn't have the Flintstones. If someone hadn't ripped
off Sergeant Bilco, there'd be no Tomcat. Huckleberry Hound,
Chief Wiggum, Yogi Bear, ha, Andy Griffith. - One of the all-time great
side gags of the Simpsons is to break the fourth
wall and say that the idea of Chief Wiggum is stolen
from somewhere else. Just, just A+, and there's some truth
to what he's saying, that these characters are often homages and frankly, stolen from other places. So whether you get copyright protection over a specific character
itself is up for grabs, and not all taking is illegal,
not all copying is illegal. - Well Itchy & Scratchy are gone, but here's a cartoon that
tries to make learning fun. (giggles) (groans) Sorry about this, kids. - Oh I know what this is. This is one of the most
brilliantly-written parodies of all time, I can sing this entire song. - Hey, who left all this garbage
on the steps of Congress? - I'm not garbage. ♪ I'm an amendment to be ♪ ♪ Yes an amendment to be ♪ ♪ And I'm hoping that they'll ratify me ♪ ♪ There's a lot of flag burners ♪ ♪ Who have got too much freedom ♪ ♪ I want to make it ♪ - First Amendment violation. ♪ Make it legal for
policemen to beat them ♪ ♪ Because there's limits
to our liberties ♪ ♪ At least I hope and
pray that there are ♪ ♪ Because those liberal
freaks go too far ♪ (laughing) - Dad, can we have $183,000? - What for? - Lisa and I want to finance
a series of animated cartoons. - Oh, forget it. - Animation Legal Precedents. Copyright Law 1918 to 1923. That is such a great little detail there because there actually was an amendment to the Copyright Act in 1923
that changed copyright law, and in fact, because of the
change in copyright law, all works before 1923
are out of copyright, so ironically although the
litigation over this case of a copyright from 1919
is raging in this episode, now looking back, all of this
would be out of copyright. The copyright in Itchy & Scratchy would be null and void and all of that stuff would have entered into the public domain. So it's a great little detail
that they are looking at the correct copyright law for the time, and since the work was created in 1919, you'd have to look at the law that existed before the Copyright Act of 1923, because that's how you sort of
retroactively apply the law. Just, just from top to bottom, one of the best Simpsons
episodes of all time. - When no one could think of a plan to resurrect Itchy &
Scratchy, a young boy, a wonderful, irrepressible young boy took it on his own to solve the problem. He discovered that the
postal service's Mr. Zip was just a rip-off of my father's stick figure character Manic Mailman. (laughs) So the government gave me
a huge cash settlement. - So that sounds totally ridiculous and there are still the
questions of whether you can even have a copyright in
a not really thought-out character like that, but
a situation almost exactly like that actually did
happen in a famous case involving the US Postal Service. The US Postal Service created a stamp where they took a photo
of the Korean War Memorial in Washington DC, which
is a series of statues with soldiers who were
wading through the snow, and they put it on a stamp. The thing is, the artist
who created the statues still had a copyright in the statues. You can have a copyright in statues just look you can have a
copyright in paintings or a novel, so when they created this
stamp without his permission, they committed copyright infringement in the same way that the US
Postal Service supposedly created copyright infringement
in this particular case. So things like that actually do happen and you can sometimes get
a big cash settlement from the government when they
involve copyright infringement. - And Itchy & Scratchy
Studios is back in business. (triumphant music)
(electricity buzzing) Thanks to you, Lester. (gasping) - What the hell is going on? - And they end the episode
poking fun at the fact that their own characters are derivative, just so good. (playful music) But now it's time to give
this episode of the Simpsons a grade for legal realism. (gavel bangs) So on the one hand, you
have a brilliant story involving some really detailed aspects of copyright law that you
really don't see all that often, and for the most part it
gets the copyright stuff exactly right, right down
to the dates involved where the copyright law changed. You have probably one
of the best depictions of a Schoolhouse Rock
parody that is not only, I think hilarious but exactly
right on First Amendment law. But on the other hand,
you have a trial that is abbreviated to be the
shortest trial known to man, without any of the boring parts, and the worst lawyer known to man in the form of Lionel Hutz, but in some sense, the writers must know what they're doing because
there's no way to write a lawyer that bad without
knowing what a lawyer should do. So all in all, I will give this episode of the Simpsons an A-. Maybe I'm giving them a
high grade just because I love this episode so, so much, but it's my show and I
can do whatever I want. - There's something unsettling about that. - The ideas for Itchy &
Scratchy may have been stolen, but your passwords and payment
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LegalEagle at checkout. So do you agree with my grade? Leave your objections in the comments, and check out my other real
lawyer reactions over here where I'll see you in court.
