| Abstract/Description |
RIGHTS OF DRAMATIC AUTHORS.-Assignment of right of representation-Divisibility of such rights. By an agreement between B. and C. it was agreed that in consideration of the payment on the signing thereof of £1, and the agreement on the part of C. thereinafter contained, B. should grant and give to C. for the space of three years from the date thereof the sole and exclusive right of representing or performing and of granting licences for the representation or performance in Australia and New Zealand respectively, but not elsewhere, of certain dramas of which B. was the author, upon such terms in all respects as C. should think proper; and in consideration thereof, C. agreed to pay and remit regularly to B. one half of all sums of money received by him in respect of the exercise of such rights, it being further agreed that such right should not in any case be exercised for any other than a consideration in money, and that no gain or loss consequent upon the exercise of the right in anyone instance should be set against the gain or loss in any other instance. Subsequently the defendant, a proprietor of a theatre, having without the licence of C. performed, and threatened to repeat the performance of one of the dramas mentioned in such agreement, and C. having thereupon filed a bill praying for an injunction to restrain the defendant from so doing. Held--first, that the agreement was a licence only from B. to C., and not an assigmment. Second--That a right of representation is indivisible and cannot be assigned in part, and therefore that the agreement even if it were an assignment was void. |
Resource
Provide feedback on Coppin v Solomon [1868] SALawRp 33; (1868) 2 SALR 83 (6 July 1868)