Paris Hilton finds her talent niche: litigious living

September 1st, 2009. By AbiK

Paris Hilton may not have found her talent niche yet, but she apparently knows how to work the systems—PR and courts, that is. You have to give her credit, she’s tried modeling, acting (tv, viral-release video, and film), singing, perfuming (is that a word?)…but it’s only been recently that she may have found her true calling: a litigious living.

Paris and the Law: Take One

Someone—namely some film investors—had the nerve to file a lawsuit against Paris alleging that she failed to promote her 2006 box office miss “Pledge This!”. See, the movie didn’t quite provide the hoped for ROI, so the investors kind of wanted some money back ($8.3 million, specifically). So they went after what they perceived to be the best target: Paris. Deep pockets? Check! Possible reason film sucked? Check! They figured, hey, easy way to recoup that investment. Unfortunately, U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno didn’t quite agree. He felt the lawsuit was based on speculation. Oh, she may have to cough up around $1 mill, but still…Paris is 1-0.

Paris and the Law: Take Two

Fast-forward to 2007 when Paris took the reins and went after Hallmark. Those creative types in Missouri played off some pop culture (Paris!) and created a greeting card with a cartoon image of a waitress on it. Ahh, but the cartoon had an actual image of Paris’ head superimposed on it, with the caption, “That’s hot”. Paris didn’t take it too kindly—she apparently feels Hallmark got the idea from an episode of “The Simple Life” where she played a waitress (I’m sure everyone in the studio at Hallmark was watching, of course). Needless to say, Hallmark didn’t obtain permission. Hallmark is claiming it was a parody (parody would be protected w/fair use law). Seems logical…Paris Hilton…parody… However, the 9th U.S. District Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling that’ll allow the case to move forward. Paris, 2-0.

I’ll refrain from further dissection on the relationship between “parody” and Paris Hilton. That’s for over at Perez… 

Tags: Hallmark, Lex Levity, Paris Hilton

This was posted on Tuesday, September 1st, 2009 at 1:05 pm and is filed under Lex Levity . Feel free to respond, or trackback. Read our comments policy.