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Alan Dean Foster, in his late 20s, met George Lucas, who was standing near the Millennium Balkan model in a warehouse in Southern California, to discuss the novel adaptation of his upcoming film “Star Wars.”
Mr. Mr. Lucas. The original contract called for an advance payment of 500 7,500, until Foster threw out 0.5% royalty on sales. Now 74 years old, Mr. When the original 1977 blockbuster set box office records and the novelist he wrote sold over a million copies, they came out several times a year.
Then, in 2012, Walt Disney Co. Lucasfilm Ltd. was acquired – and royalty checks were discontinued.
Now, Mr. Foster and the other authors of the Disney acquisitions are embroiled in a bitter dispute with Hollywood’s largest empire, which they say refuses to pay royalties on the $ 4 billion Lucasfilm deal and book deals included in other acquisitions. The amount of money is too small for a company the size of Disney, but important for writers looking for it. Although Disney has mined Lucasfilm for new films that have grossed a total of $ 6 billion at the box office worldwide, these writers claim that the company has been slow in handling their complaints and has rarely imposed a few thousand bucks in total checks.
Mr. As Foster’s controversy has been publicly taken up by the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, other authors of books linked to projects ranging from Indiana Jones to “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” have come forward with stories of royalty checks discontinued after Disney’s purchase. Properties. In each case, they have seized it, despite obstacles we can scarcely imagine. ” Complex issues: The exact amount of money is not known as sales and royalties for the books involved fluctuate greatly over time.
A Disney spokesman said: “We are carefully considering whether any royalty payments may have been missed as a result of the acquisition consolidation, and we will take appropriate remedial action.”
Well known to longtime Star Wars fans, Mr. Foster says Disney ignores working-class players who help create cohesive connections with loving characters. He and his wife are in poor health and may receive royalties for medical expenses.
“I’m not Steve Spielberg, I’m not Steve King. I don’t even have a name that starts with Steve,” he said.
Mr. The controversy began in the summer of 2019, the twentieth-produced space horror series, about why Foster’s literary agent, Vaughan Hanson, stopped receiving royalty checks on three novels linked to “Alien” by Disney. Century Fox acquired Disney Studios in 2019 as part of a $ 71.3 billion deal.
Mr. Foster and his agent realized the same thing happened to his royalty for the two Star Wars books after they bought Disney Lucasfilm.
In response to questions about the “Alien” checks, a Disney lawyer, Mr. Foster said the company has acquired the rights to these books, but not the obligations to pay royalties. But in the case of “Alien”, Mrs. Hanson, Mr. The rights to Foster’s novels were restructured several times, without interfering with royalty checks, prior to the purchase of Disney Fox.
“Disney bought a house with a mortgage. They want to continue living in that house. They don’t want to pay the mortgage,” Mr. Foster said.
The team of writers says a similar pattern has developed following other Disney acquisitions. Mary Robinette Cowell, president of American science fiction and fantasy writers, said at least half a dozen writers on assets owned by Disney claim they were on the same boat.
Disney has begun to reconsider the “Alien” case, but Mr. Foster has an array of writers waiting for a turn at the negotiating table. Overall, Ms. Hansen estimates that her client earned more than $ 50,000 in royalties on original Star Wars upgrades before the checks stopped in 2012.
If Disney agrees to calculate the missing royalties, it faces a difficult task of tracking sales that cover six years, Mr. In the case of Foster alone, five novels published in dozens of international markets.
Donald Clude, who wrote the 1980s novel “The Empire Strikes Back” and James Kahn, who adapted the third trilogy of the original trilogy, “Return of the Jedi”, both claimed that royalty checks were missing.
Ms. Cowell said the Writers’ Association could take further action if a resolution is not reached, including disqualifying its members, including adding Disney to its list of publishers. The word given to such a post is: “Beware of the writer.”
Write to Erich Swartz at [email protected]
