Dear Mr R Hog,
Yes, all these agreements are different. I have half a dozen sitting in my file cabinet. I even fought a successful lawsuit over the interpretation of the terms of one of these. But unless the underlying rights holder is also a co-writer of the adaptation, there are usually a number of markers of when the rights holder can pull the plug, or block certain kinds of productions. Re Grovers Corners, in 2007 (I believe) Tom Jones was on Playbill Radio talking about the fact that Grovers Corners had been, and still was, restricted by the Wilder Estate. As far as I know, this is still the case.
In most of these Agreements there are hoops to go through before the underlying rights merge with the adaptation, and the adaptation becomes an independent produceable entity. This has never happened with Grovers Corners.
From 1998-2007 various incarnations of Kander and Ebb's SKIN OF OUR TEETH musical, re-titled at some point ALL ABOUT US, have appeared. Goodspeed and Wesport County Playhouse both tried to make a case for revised versions of this show, as did Eric Schaeffer at Signature Theatre in DC.
Kander is quoted as saying that Wilder's nephew (Tappan Wilder, I believe) blocked a London production , the same way that he blocked major productions of GROVERS CORNERS.
I am willing to accept that Mr Jones and Mr Kander know from whence they speak. |
