- The cartoon characters of Disney have kept children
amused
for generations. Less funny, they may find, is a dispute between the film
empire and London's Great Ormond Street Hospital over money which might
otherwise be used to treat sick children.
-
- The hospital is to consult lawyers next week to
investigate
whether a children's adventure book published by Disney in America
infringes
the hospital's long-held ownership of the copyright of J M Barrie's Peter
Pan.
-
- Millions of pounds earned from royalty fees have been
spent on helping sick children as a result of Barrie's decision to give
his copyright to the hospital before his death in 1937.
-
- Great Ormond Street, increasingly concerned at the cost
and difficulties of policing the copyright, has written to Hyperion Books,
a New York-based division of the film company, to protest that Peter and
The Starcatchers, which is billed as a prequel to Peter Pan, has been
published
without its permission.
-
- It has complained that Hyperion is denying the hospital
money that it could spend on research and medical equipment. The hospital
said Barrie's original fairy story remains in copyright in America until
2023, even though it runs out in Europe in 2007.
-
- Disney was equally emphatic yesterday that Peter Pan
was already out of copyright in America.
-
- In a statement last night Disney said: "The
copyright
to the J M Barrie stories expired in the US prior to 1998, the effective
date of the US Copyright Extension Act, and thus were ineligible for any
extension of their term. With another American test case - over a Peter
Pan sequel published three years ago - pending before the courts, Great
Ormond Street is now fearful that Barrie's book has become a free-for-all
in America and that it stands to lose millions of pounds before
2023.
-
- But the hospital says privately that it is a hard-pressed
charity and it may not be able to afford a long court case in
America.
-
- Hyperion admitted yesterday that Peter and the
Starcatchers
is based on Peter Pan and that permission had not been sought. A spokesman
said: "We are very certain that in the US Peter Pan is in the public
domain."
-
- Peter and the Starcatchers was written by two Americans,
Dave Barry, a Pulitzer prize-winning humour columnist, and Ridley Pearson,
a crime writer, and was published with much fanfare and a long authors'
tour last month.
-
- The book tells the story of Peter, an orphan and
"the
leader of the Lost Boys", and his adventures with pirates and thieves
on the High Seas. Peter's ship is called Never Land.
-
- The other case hanging over the hospital is a book called
After the Rain - A New Adventure for Peter Pan by a little-known Canadian
author, Emily Somma. First published in Canada, where Peter Pan is out
of copyright, it then went on sale in California.
-
- A spokesman insisted that copyright in America had been
extended to 2023 from 2007 because of a law, the Copyright Extension Act,
passed in 1998.
-
- He said: "We are very disappointed at the
publication
of this new book and we will be discussing it with our lawyers next
week."
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- © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2004.
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