NEWS
TOTAL LICENSING
NEW YORK FEDERAL JUDGE RULES THAT THERE IS NO
RIGHT OF PUBLICITY IN THE IMAGE OF MARILYN MONROE
Judge Colleen McMahon of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
ruled on May 2
nd
2007 that Marilyn Monroe LLC (MMLLC) has no right of publicity in the name, like-
ness and image of Marilyn Monroe. The case arises from a litigation that MMLLC and its licensing agent
CMG Worldwide, Inc asserted in Indiana against the Shaw Family Archives Ltd. (SFA) and its licensing
agent, Bradford Licensing Associates (BLA). Among the photographs owned by SFA and comprising
the Sam Shaw – Marilyn Monroe Collection is a series of copyrighted photographs of Marilyn Monroe,
including many famous Marilyn images like the iconic flying skirt series over the New York subway grate
for the movie The Seven Year Itch. MMLLC and CMG asserted that Shaw Family Archives and Bradford
Licensing violated MMLLC’s state right of publicity in Marilyn Monroe by licensing photographic images
of Marilyn Monroe. SFA filed its own complaint in New York federal court for copyright infringement
and other causes of action against CMG and MMLLC. The case was transferred to the United States
District Court for the Southern District of New York and both complaints were consolidated.
New York federal Judge Colleen McMahon ruled on summary judgement that MMLLC has no right of
publicity in Marilyn Monroe to assert because when she died in 1962, none of the states in which she
was possibly domiciled (New York or California) recognised a descendible postmortem publicity right.
Thus, when Marilyn Monroe died, she had no publicity right in her image to pass to her heirs or benefi-
ciaries. SFA and Bradford Licensing plan to vigorously pursue their counterclaims, including their claim
that MMLLC and CMG interfered with their licensing relationships by claiming that they had a right to
the name, likeness and image of Marilyn Monroe that the court has now ruled did not exist.
To date, Bradford Licensing has successfully grown the Shaw Family Archives Licensing Program into a
worldwide phenomenon. Licensees are granted access to the priceless SFA imagery to produce mer-
chandise portraying the beauty and glamour of Marilyn. This win represents a huge stake in the Monroe
business, allowing those closest to Marilyn such as the Shaw Family to forever preserve her image and
personality with merchandising and promotions.
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