Musical biopics have been big business for years. For John Ottman they’ve been award winners. Ottman did the editing for the recently released Michael and won an Academy Award for editing on Bohemian Rhapsody. Now he’s going to be directing the film, Billy & Me about Billy Joel. The only problem is, Joel never consented to his life being told in this story.
What we end up having here is a case where Joel seems to be completely right. However, this could also be a legal gray area that this project finds itself in. A person’s life is their own. Someone may be able to make a story similar to events in your life or inspired by various parts. This doesn’t mean though that they can just turn your life into a film without your consent. It very much seems like Ottman and screenwriter Adam Ripp are trying to get around this by the means of two people in Billy Joel’s life. They secured the rights to the life stories of Joe’s former manager, Irwin Mazur and Joel’s friend, Jon Small.
Ottman states that, “The film is told from the perspective of Irwin Mazur, and we hold the exclusive life rights or Irwin Mazur. And the film neither depicts nor seems to use any of Billy Joel’s original music because it takes place during his formative years performing cover songs with The Hassles and struggling to find his artistic identity.” He continues by saying, “The project is based on Irwin Mazur’s firsthand experiences and his legitimate right to tell his own life story and perspective surrounding the events depicted in the film.”
Ripp goes a bit deeper with his statement. He says, “The project was always designed as an intimate origin story focused on the people and relationships surrounding BIlly during this specific period of his life.” He then comments that the film is primarily from Mazur’s point of view. But did Ripp give away the ghost in that statement? He’s basically stating that this is a story about Billy Joel’s early life. He directly says it’s about the “people and relationships surrounding Billy during this specific period of his life.” The “his” in that sentence is referring to Joel, not Mazur.
This seems like a pretty transparent way of making a biopic about someone people might want to see a biopic about, without having the rights to that person’s life. Let’s face it, no one’s going to see a film about the life of Irwin Mazur or Jon Small. People WILL see a story about Billy Joel though. Are the actions of Ottman and Ripp legally actionable? We guess that kind of depends on the script. If this turns out to legitimately be about Mazur’s relationship to Billy, it would seem safe. But it this story really focuses around Billy Joel and Joel’s life, Joel may have the right to sue.
If this does turn litigious, it could also have implications for future biopics and the rights people have to their own lives. We will continue to follow this case with an investigative eye. This is more than “A Matter of Trust” for this “Piano Man.”
