Kelly M. Klaus

Klaus is one of the top litigators protecting movie, TV and record companies’ copyrights on their artistic productions. This year saw him finally close out a five-year battle against a company that argued a Copyright Act amendment allowed it to stream censored movies and shows without studio authorization.

The litigation began in 2016 with a lawsuit he filed for the Walt Disney Co. and other studios against VidAngel Inc. After an injunction, a countersuit, appeals and a week of trial in 2019, a jury awarded Klaus’s clients $62.4 million.

The company filed bankruptcy in its home state of Utah, where Klaus took an active part in the Chapter 11 proceedings. Finally, in September, VidAngel agreed to stop copying or streaming the studios’ content and to pay $9.9 million.

“Ultimately getting the resolution through the bankruptcy process was immensely gratifying,” he said. In re VidAngel Inc., 17-29073 (Utah Bankruptcy Ct., filed Sep. 4, 2020).

Then in November, Klaus and his team won a permanent injunction and a $40 million judgment for Disney and a consortium of other studios against a streaming service that pirated on-demand and live broadcasts without authorization, Klaus said. Disney Enterprises Inc. v. TTKN Enterprises LLC, 20-CV07274 (C.D. Cal., filed Aug 12, 2020).

That case was just the latest of several he has brought against illicit streaming services in the last several years. “These are very significant problems for the motion picture industry,” he said.

He also is defending Disney and other studios in a far more complex case that centers on some “facial motion capture” software that helped make Disney’s Beast and the Marvel supervillain Thanos come to live-action life on screen.

The plaintiff says a digital effects company copied its software to animate those characters, and it seeks the millions in “indirect profits” from the studios.

Klaus questions whether his clients are responsible for the infringement or whether it is responsible for any profits.

“There’s no actual evidence that the copying of the software caused people to pay to see the movie,” he said. Rearden LLC v. Walt Disney Co., 17-CV04006, (N.D. Cal., filed July 17, 2017).

With cases like that, Klaus says he truly enjoys his practice. “For somebody who loves copyright and loves the motion picture business, it’s a dream.”

— Don DeBenedictis