Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino plans to sue the viral news website Gawker after the site shared a leaked, pre-production copy of his latest script.Shortly after Tarantino revealed that he would shelve his movie Hateful Eight, releasing it first as a novel and perhaps revisiting the project as a film in a few years, because someone close to the production had leaked the script to agents around Hollywood, Gawker wrote a story inviting readers to check out the script that had caused so much hubbub.”I gave it to one of the producers on Django Unchained, Reggie Hudlin, and he let an agent come to his house and read it,” Tarantino said at the time [Hudlin is a well-known comic book writer]. “That’s a betrayal, but not crippling because the agent didn’t end up with the script. There is an ugly maliciousness to the rest of it. I gave it to three actors: Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, Tim Roth. The one I know didn’t do this is Tim Roth. One of the others let their agent read it, and that agent has now passed it on to everyone in Hollywood. I don’t know how these f—ing agents work, but I’m not making this next. I’m going to publish it, and that’s it for now. I give it out to six people, and if I can’t trust them to that degree, then I have no desire to make it. I’ll publish it. I’m done. I’ll move on to the next thing. I’ve got 10 more where that came from.”Tarantino has filed a formal legal complaint this morning in U.S. District Court, Central District Of California Western Division (read it here, courtesty of Deadline). The legal complaint charges Gawker with copyright infringement and contributory copyright infringement. Tarantino’s attorney will be noted entertainment lawyer Martin Singer.The complaint claims that Gawker refused to take down the post, or deactivate outbound links to a copy of the infringing material.”Gawker Media has made a business of predatory journalism, violating people’s right to make a buck. This time they’ve gone too far,” says the complaint, in part. “Rather than merely publishing a news story reporting that Plaintiff’s screenplay may have been circulating in Hollywood without his permission, Gawker Media crossed the journalistic line by promoting itself to the public as the first source to read the entire screenplay illegally. Their headline boasts, ‘Here is the leaked Quentin Tarantino Hateful Eight Script’ — here, not someplace else, but ‘here’ on the Gawker website. The article then contains multiple direct links for downloading the entire screenplay through a conveniently anonymous URL by simply clicking button-links on the Gawker page, and brazenly encourages Gawker visitors to read the screenplay illegally with an invitation to ‘enjoy’ it. There was nothing newsworthy or journalistic about Gawker Media facilitating and encouraging the public’s violation of Plaintiff’s copyright in the screenplay, and its conduct will not shield Gawker Media from liability for their unlawful activity.”
