Entertainment Transactions

In an entertainment world that increasingly values cross-media knowledge, our experience in virtually all areas of this industry, from motion pictures to Broadway productions to computer games, allows us to provide valuable and prompt advice to our clients.

Our entertainment transactions practice provides a broad spectrum of legal services to our clients in the entertainment, sports and media industries, including:

• Rights acquisitions for entertainment productions in all media
• Motion picture, television, home video/DVD development, production and distribution
• Debt and/or equity financing arrangements for motion picture and television productions
• Production and financing for live theatrical productions on Broadway and in other theatrical arenas
• Streaming and download of music on the Internet
• Music licensing and publishing issues
• Licensing of famous fictional characters and trademarks in connection with a wide variety of goods and services including video games, toys and apparel
• Trademark counseling, registration practice and dispute resolution
• Copyright counseling, including joint authorship issues, termination of licenses and work-for-hire issues
• Print, online, radio and television syndication agreements
• Sale of artwork and other matters affecting the visual arts
• Development, distribution, licensing and marketing video games and board games
• Comic books and graphic novels – engagement of talent, licensing of rights and distribution agreements 

With a significant presence in New York City and Los Angeles, as well as San Francisco and the Pacific Northwest, Davis Wright Tremaine is well positioned to provide services in both the entertainment and technology centers of the country. Our firm has long represented many prominent entertainment and media companies of all sizes. We represent most of the major motion picture studios and television networks, as well as independent production companies, financiers and legitimate stage production companies.