NICHOLAS V. UNIVERSAL PICTURES CORPORATION 45 F.2D 119 (2D CIR. 1930)
FACTS
Anne Nichols (plaintiff) wrote a play called the “Abie’s Irish Rose.” The play was about an Irish father and a Jewish father whose children married each other in secret because they feared that their fathers would not have approved. The underlying theme of the play was the hatred between the fathers for each other and for the relationship of their children.
The animosity between the fathers was based on their religious differences. Eventually, the children had their own children and as a result, the fathers reconciled. Much humor and comedy was followed in the play.
After the play had exhausted its Broadway debut, Universal Pictures Corporation (Universal) (the defendant) made a movie called “The Cohens and the Kellys.” The movie was also based on an Irish Catholic and a Jewish family whose children wed. The fathers similarly did not get along, but not due to their differing religions, more on account of the general animosity of the Jewish father, which is to say that only one of the fathers held the story grudge.
Also similarly, the children had their own child, and the fathers eventually reconciled. However, in the movie, the grandchild had nothing to do with the reconciliation. The main themes throughout “The Cohens and the Kellys” were family finances and the relationship between wealth, generosity and how honesty brings families together. Religion did not play a role.
The plaintiff asserted copyright infringement in the lawsuit based on the premise that defendant used similar story elements. The district court found in favor of Universal. Nichols appealed.
ISSUE
Whether the defendant's film (The Cohens and the Kellys) had infringed the plaintiff's copyright in the play (Abie’s Irish Rose) by using similar elements?
HELD
The Appellate Court noted that a work could be a copy of an earlier work even if it didn't copy the literal text, but the two works needed to be substantially similar. The Court also found that although the play and the movie shared a number of the similar themes and general plots, the similarities general things, universal concepts, and stereotypical characters (stock characters). There was nothing unique to Nichols' play that was found in Universal's movie.
The court based its decisions on the Scenes å faire doctrine which reasons that copyright does not extent to incidents, character, or settings that are as a practical matter, indispensable or at least industry standard in the behaviour/common practice of a given topic. So for example, all police shows are going to have the same stereotypical characters, but those similar characters are no copyright violations.