Disney screwing over Alan Dean Foster

I thought this would be appropriate to share here in the forum. [url=https://www.sfwa.org/2020/11/18/disney-must-pay/]Article Link[/url].

Apparently Disney is refusing to pay noted science fiction author Alan Dean Foster his deserved royalties for the Star Wars books he wrote. They won't even show him the royalty statements and refuse to answer Foster, his agents or the Science Fiction Writers Association inquiries. They are making a completely BS reasoning for why they aren't paying him which should scare the hell out of every writer everywhere.

And it confirms yet again that Disney is simply pure evil.

#DisneyMustPay

I thought the issue was that he wasn't getting royalty for the orginal EP 4 novelization but still getting paid for all the others?

[QUOTE=Arsenal;5242178]I thought the issue was that he wasn't getting royalty for the orginal EP 4 novelization but still getting paid for all the others?[/QUOTE]

Not according to what that statement and the other stuff I read. But regardless, if Disney isn't living up to the signed contract and continuing to sell and receive money for anything he wrote, they are scum and criminals.

Yes Disney owns Star Wars but why would they be the ones paying out for a contract ADF had with Lucasfilm? I'd imagine this wasn't with any of the of the various book publishers and instead this is with the I.P holders right? So ADF should be yelling at Lucasfilm if they're the ones he had the agreement with. Disney owns Star Wars but that's by way of owning Lucasfilm. Disney wanted a confidential E-mail with him I would presume to explain that. If he's getting anything still than it would still be through the company he worked with.

[QUOTE=SuperiorIronman;5242831]Yes Disney owns Star Wars but why would they be the ones paying out for a contract ADF had with Lucasfilm? I'd imagine this wasn't with any of the of the various book publishers and instead this is with the I.P holders right? So ADF should be yelling at Lucasfilm if they're the ones he had the agreement with. Disney owns Star Wars but that's by way of owning Lucasfilm. Disney wanted a confidential E-mail with him I would presume to explain that. If he's getting anything still than it would still be through the company he worked with.[/QUOTE]

Why would they be paying him? Because he has right to stories they are continuing to publish and profit from. It's a simple concept; he was contracted to get so much in royalties for future printings of his stories and that contract isn't void simply because another company bought the company his original agreement was with.

[QUOTE=thwhtGuardian;5242901]Why would they be paying him? Because he has right to stories they are continuing to publish and profit from. It's a simple concept; he was contracted to get so much in royalties for future printings of his stories and that contract isn't void simply because another company bought the company his original agreement was with.[/QUOTE]

My point is wouldn't you just go through Lucasfilm rather than those who he didn't have a contract with? Disney owns it but his contract is presumably with Lucasfilm.

Why he's being paid is not in question, what is is why he would go to Disney and not the people whom he was already getting the money from.

[QUOTE=SuperiorIronman;5242954]My point is wouldn't you just go through Lucasfilm rather than those who he didn't have a contract with? Disney owns it but his contract is presumably with Lucasfilm.

Why he's being paid is not in question, what is is why he would go to Disney and not the people whom he was already getting the money from.[/QUOTE]

Because Disney owns Lucasfilm, gets all the benefits from owning it, and owes all the liabilities of it. Lucasfilm is not an independent entity anymore, it is a part of Disney. Its debts and revenues are Disney's not Lucasfilm's. Lucasfilm doesn't pay anything or reap any profits of its own anymore, they are an asset of Disney's media empire. When Disney acquired all the rights and properties of Lucasfilm, they acquired all the debts and liabilities associated with Lucasfilm, including royalty payments owed to various creators of the IP they acquired. That's the way contract law works in the U.S.

-M

[QUOTE=MRP;5242975]Because Disney owns Lucasfilm, gets all the benefits form owning it and owes all the liabilities of it. Lucasfilm is not an independent entity anymore, it is a part of Disney. Its debts and revenues are Disney's not Lucasfilm's. Lucasfilm doesn't pay anything or reap any profits of its own anymore, hey are an asset of Disney's media empire. When Disney acquired all the rights and properties of Lucasfilm, they acquired all the debts and liabilities associated with Lucasfilm, including royalty payments owed to various creators of the IP they acquired. That's the way contract law works in the U.S.

-M[/QUOTE]

Exactly this, Lucasfilm isn't an independent entity it's just a part of Disney so Forester is due money from Disney.

Alright that makes sense. If Lucasfilm's contracts are taken by Disney then all that changes is the person who signs the check. Got it.
But then who's been sitting on this contract for 8 years not telling the higher ups they have to pay ADF since they now own the contract Lucasfilm had with him? Why did he wait 8 years?

[QUOTE=SuperiorIronman;5243003]Alright that makes sense. If Lucasfilm's contracts are taken by Disney then all that changes is the person who signs the check. Got it.
But then who's been sitting on this contract for 8 years not telling the higher ups they have to pay ADF since they now own the contract Lucasfilm had with him? Why did he wait 8 years?[/QUOTE]

He's been working through channels. He took his complaint to the SFWA a while back since they are essentially a guild/union whose purpose is to protect and advocate for the writer-members. They were stonewalled by Disney. Their standard procedure is to keep such attempts out of the public eye/anonymous, but they recently went public because they were getting nowhere with Disney, who wanted Foster to sign an NDA before they would even discuss the matter with him. They wont public because of this and because they believe there may be other writers/creators who are experiencing similar issues with payment form Disney but who have not yet come forward for various reasons ho might also now speak out (and create a possible class-action suit which has a greater chance of succeeding against a corporation than a single plaintiff suit would). Just because we are now hearing about this doesn't mean that Foster hasn't been trying to rectify this and the process has taken years to get to this point.

-M

[QUOTE=SuperiorIronman;5243003]Alright that makes sense. If Lucasfilm's contracts are taken by Disney then all that changes is the person who signs the check. Got it.
But then who's been sitting on this contract for 8 years not telling the higher ups they have to pay ADF since they now own the contract Lucasfilm had with him? Why did he wait 8 years?[/QUOTE]

They haven't been waiting...this was all covered in the article.