NOV. 4, 2026 – The Ninth Circuit has upheld a California jury's decision rejecting an $81 million copyright infringement claim against the acclaimed filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan and others involved in the production of the streaming series "Servant."
The Ninth Circuit panel agreed with our team that the trial court had properly instructed the jury and properly allowed the jury to return its verdict, which found that the defendants lacked access to plaintiff's film and thus no copying had occurred. The verdict was a resounding victory for the defendants, who maintained from the beginning of the case that the creators of "Servant" had not previously seen plaintiff's firm and that the two works were not substantially similar.
Davis Wright Tremaine LLP partners Nicolas Jampol and Cydney Swofford Freeman, and lead associate Meenakshi Krishnan, represented the defendants over the course of the nearly 7-year litigation.
The appeal was led by DWT's James Sigel and Krishnan.
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Davis Wright Tremaine LLP is an AmLaw 100 law firm with more than 600 lawyers in 9 offices across the U.S. The firm has been named a Law360 Media and Entertainment Practice Group of the Year nine times in the last decade. Learn more at dwt.com.