For those of you who appreciate legal issues, the history of Urinetown offers a unique and interesting chapter in theatrical litigation history. And it gives us an opportunity to think about the concept of plagiarism, especially as it relates to theatrical productions.
As most of you probably already know, the script and score for Broadway musicals aren't free; not only do you have to rent or purchase the scripts and vocal books for the show, you also have to pay for the right to do the show, typically in the form of royalties, some percentage of the ticket price your theatre will be charging. These royalties are paid to the original show's authors (or their estates) to compensate them for using their copyrighted work.
Music Theatre International (MTI) is the licensing agent for Urinetown. That means that Ovation will be paying a sum of money to MTI for the right to mount this show here in Oak Park. Every single performance of Urinetown (outside the original Broadway production) is required to pay for these rights, and to acknowledge in its program that the original book and music were created by Greg Kotis and Mark Hollmann.
In 2006, an unusual lawsuit was filed by the original creative team of Urinetown. The year before, a Chicago production team purchased the licensing rights to perform Urinetown at the Mercury Theatre, one of the first professional productions of Urinetown to be mounted in Chicago. The Chicago creative team used the same script and music, and produced a version of Urinetown that was very similar to the Broadway production, albeit on a somewhat smaller scale.
The Broadway creative team sued the Chicago team (and a similar production team in Ohio), arguing that the Chicago team had only purchased the rights to the script and music, but that they had essentially copied many other elements of the production as well: choreography, costume design, lighting design, staging and direction. No such lawsuit like this had ever before been filed. This lawsuit made national news, and was followed very closely by the theatrical community. If the federal court ruled that all of the ancillary production elements were also protected by copyright (even though no copyright had ever been issued for these elements), then the future of all non-Broadway theatre would be radically changed.
I have fairly strong opinions on this matter, as a director that wantonly steals (I mean, borrows) good ideas from other directors, choreographers, and designers. In fact, I contend that it is impossible to recreate a faithful version of any Broadway show without some degree of replication of the original elements. Broadway is more than just a script and score; it is a visual medium, and both the script and the score depend upon proper staging to make a show work.
Let's look at an example. During the Act I finale of Urinetown, Bobby Strong rallies the crowds to revolt against the tyranny of the UGC corporation. At a very specific moment, the music builds to a crescendo, and then breaks into a military march, with lyrics that would be at home in any revolutionary hymn. The music was deliberately written this way to accommodate a joke in the original staging. At this moment, the crowds began waving signs, and replicated the stationary "march" from Les Miserables, complete with a waving red flag. The Chicago production recreated the idea of the Les Miz march, and the Broadway team used this as evidence of blatant plagiarism of direction and choreography.
Was it? The music clearly signals a revolutionary style at that point in the show, and it is clear that the music had been written to support this exact parody of Les Miz. This moment gets one of the biggest laughs in the show. Could it be staged in some other way? Of course, but that misses the point. If you want to produce Urinetown, wouldn't it be reasonable to capture all of its best parodies and jokes, including one joke skewering Les Miz, even if the Les Miz reference isn't explicitly indicated in the script? I think yes.
If the federal court ruled against the Chicago team what would that mean? Could you imaging staging Peter Pan without flying Peter through the central nursery windows? Giving Tracy Turnblad some other hairstyle than her iconic flip, or Annie without her final red perm? Staging 42nd Street without tap dancing? Joseph without a multi-colored coat? Theoretically, none of these would be possible (without additional licensing fees) if the Broadway team had a court rule in their favor.
It has long been understood that set designs are copyrighted materials, as are a show's script and score. Copyrights are actually filed for these production elements by their creators, specifically in order to protect them. Costume designers, lighting designers, choreographers, and directors have never filed copyrights for their work. I think this is a clear indication that these elements were considered ripe for replication, and an obvious expectation on their creators' part. The Chicago production team agreed with me, and argued to the court that since Urinetown was so full of theatrical parody, that it was impossible to produce without a certain degree of replication, and that these elements were not protected by copyright in any case.
I find it particularly ironic that the original production team of Urinetown, a show which blatantly steals from dozens of shows in an effort to parody them, judged themselves abused when their own work was in turn copied and interpreted.
I wish I could tell you who won the lawsuit, but I can't. It settled out of court before a verdict could be reached, and so it remains anyone's guess whether or not these ancillary production elements can be considered to be protected intellectual property. The legal community was disappointed in the result, but will simply have to wait for the next lawsuit to be filed. In the meantime, watch out if you plan to steal any of Urinetown's original staging ideas (I do).
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