Watch that Reindeer. (Up Front).THE publishers of the song "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer reindeer, ruminant mammal, genus Rangifer, of the deer family, found in arctic and subarctic regions of Eurasia and North America. It is the only deer in which both sexes have antlers. The Eurasian reindeer, Rangifer tarandus, is a small deer, the male standing about 4 ft (120 cm) high at the shoulder and weighing about 250 lb (113 kg), but it is extremely strong and has great powers of endurance." won an appellate ruling re-affirming their ownership of merchandising rights. Emmy award-nominated television producer Fred Rappoport sued the song's publishers -- Bill Trigg, Ellyn Trigg and Elmo Shropshire Shropshire (shrŏp`shĭr, –shər), county (1991 pop. 401,600), 1,348 sq mi (3,491 sq km), W England. It is also sometimes called Salop. The county seat is Shrewsbury. The terrain to the north and east of the Severn, Shropshire's principal river, is level; toward the Welsh border and the south the land is hilly. -- in L.A. Superior Court four years ago, asking a judge to rule on the ownership of merchandising rights to the song. At issue were rights included in a 1996 agreement among the parties that allowed Rappoport to make an animated film based on the song. Rappoport claims he owns all the merchandising rights associated with the film. "Our premise is since the program was built around the song, it includes exclusive merchandising rights to the song," said Richard Leonard, a partner at Leonard Dicker & Schreiber LIP, representing Rappoport. In 1997, toy manufacturer Dan-Dee International Ltd. made a stuffed reindeer that sang the song based on an agreement with its publishers, according to the ruling. Jan Stanley Mason, a Glendale attorney representing the publishers, said Rappoport got "greedy" after Dan-Dee made hundreds of thousands of dollars on the sale of its reindeer toy. A lower court declared the agreement too ambiguous for a definitive ruling. The publishers and Rappoport both appealed. On Feb. 6, 2003, an appellate judge stated the agreement did not give Rappoport exclusive merchandising rights to the song, only to a "dramatic use of the plot or characters," such as a film. |
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