Disney plundered a copyright owned by other people in creating its hugely successful “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie franchise, according to a lawsuit filed by writers Arthur Lee Alfred II, E. Ezequiel Martinez Jr. and their producer Tova Laiter.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Colorado on Tuesday, alleges that Disney committed “willful infringement of Plaintiff’s original copyrighted expression of themes, settings, dialogue, characters, plot. mood [and] sequence of events contained in an original spec screenplay entitled ‘Pirates of the Caribbean.’”
The suit contends that Laiter presented the screenplay to Disney executive Brigham Taylor in August 2000.
“Taylor suggested that the idea of a film based on the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ ride had been suggested over the years and that the Defendants had considered making a film based on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride recently,” the suit reads.