Vapor
A Shanghai court has accepted a lawsuit that the daughter of martial arts icon Bruce Lee filed against a Chinese fast-food chain over a logo bearing similarities to the famed actor, Sixth Tone’s sister publication The Paper reported Thursday.
Shannon Lee filed a lawsuit against
Guangzhou Kung Fu Fast Food Chain Management Co. Ltd., demanding that
the company immediately stop using an image in its logo that, according
to the lawsuit, resembles Bruce Lee. The plaintiff — who is also the
founder of Bruce Lee Enterprises, LLC — further demands that the
restaurant chain pay 210 million yuan ($30 million) in compensation and
publish a clarification in media outlets for 90 days that would
disassociate them from the martial arts star, according to Sina
Entertainment, which broke the news Wednesday.
The logo in
question depicts a man in a yellow jumpsuit striking a kung fu pose and
is believed to have infringed the rights of the martial arts film star,
Sina Entertainment reported. According to Bruce Lee Enterprises, the
company is the exclusive owner of all commercial merchandising and
allied rights involving Bruce Lee, including his name, image, logos, and
photographs.
A comparison of images used by the Kung Fu fast-food chain and photos of Bruce Lee. From @新浪娱乐 on Weibo
In
a statement Thursday, the fast-food chain said it was “puzzled” by the
lawsuit, adding that it has been using the logo for 15 years, after
receiving approval from China’s national trademark office.
“There
were disputes many years ago over whether our trademark constitutes
infringement, but our trademark has never been determined to be an
infringement,” the statement read. “We are also very puzzled about being
sued after so many years and are actively analyzing the case to respond
to the lawsuit.”
The law office representing Bruce Lee
Enterprises told Sixth Tone on Thursday that it is not accepting
interviews with media. Sixth Tone’s repeated calls to the fast-food
chain went unanswered.
In 2010, Shannon Lee accused the fast-food
chain of copyright infringement and vowed to establish a
rights-protection office in China to safeguard her father’s image,
according to domestic media reports. This year, Lee also filed a
complaint with China’s National Film Administration objecting to her
father’s depiction in the Quentin Tarantino-directed movie “Once Upon a
Time in Hollywood,” which was not released on the Chinese mainland.
This
isn’t the first time celebrities have struggled to defend their
copyrights in China. In 2012, Michael Jordan filed a lawsuit against a
China-based sportswear company that featured a name and logo similar to
the former American basketball player’s Nike-produced brand. In late
2016, the Supreme People’s Court ruled in favor of Jordan, ordering the
company to stop using the Chinese characters for his name on its
merchandise. The court determined, however, that the phonetic spelling
of the name did not constitute infringement in China.
Source: www.sixthtone.com
Author:Cai Xuejiao
Editor:Vapor