Should You Be Worried About Plagiarism?

Writers are often worried about someone stealing their idea. So let’s parse out what we should worry about, what we shouldn’t worry about, and how we can protect ourselves.

Let’s say you’ve got this killer marketable idea and it sings on the page. Great! If you send it out to someone, will they steal it from you? The answer may surprise you, given the scum and villainy in Hollywood, but for the most part, the answer is pretty much nope.

Plagiarism in Hollywood for the most part doesn’t exist, at least not in the way people think. It’s actually pretty unlikely that even an unscrupulous producer is going to simply rip off your script and make it into a movie without paying you. Frankly, to do so would be moronic, because they’re opening themselves up to lawsuits and hassles, when instead they could likely option your script for a few bucks up front and then purchase it outright if and when the production money comes in. So why steal?

Okay, so you sent out your script all over town. Nobody bit. But a couple of years later, a film comes out and it’s your core idea to the letter. What now? Well, first question: is it your story and/or a story significantly similar to yours, or is it just the core idea which is similar? Here’s the thing: with 100,000 screenwriters in LA, there’s bound to be some similar concepts floating around out there at any given time. CI founder Jim Cirile learned this the hard way years ago when his agent sent out his spec REBIRTH, a thriller about cloning Jesus from blood stains on the Shroud of Turin–only to discover there were no less than six others already out there and on producer’s desks with the exact same idea.

Does real plagiarism happen? Of course. Read on below.

Here is how plagiarism actually happens: your script goes out to producers or the studios in some significant way–either from an agent sending it around as a spec or maybe a producer slipping it into his VP connex at the studios. Or maybe it gets 8s or better on Blacklist and it gets 50 downloads. In other words, it’s gotten a fair bit of exposure.

This is where things get a bit tricky. If you get some general meetings, you’ll likely wind up telling the exec all about the projects you’re working on. The exec will generally have an assistant taking notes (or if it’s Zoom, its automated) as you tell them all about your amazing franchise idea about a sentient robot moose named Benito Moosolini.

Fast forward six months, and that exec is meeting a different writer, and said writer pitches an idea the exec sparks to. So the exec says, “Hey, that’s great. But how about we add sentient robot moose?” And so that writer—trying to curry favor with the producer–takes the note and incorporates this idea into the movie. Except that it was YOUR idea. The exec forgot where they heard it in the first place and innocently suggests it as a story beat in a different movie.

I guess you can call it passive or non-deliberate plagiarism. But let’s face it. These people are pitched ideas all day, every day. They cannot possibly remember them all. It all mashes up into a sludgy reservoir full of goo in their brain, and every good idea they have probably originated from somewhere else.

And, sure, sometimes the exec remembers very well where they got that idea and just doesn’t give a flying f@ck. The movie gets made; the other studio-approved writer(s) gets all the credit; no soup for YOU.

All of that said, you still need to protect your material.  Unfortunately, WGA registration isn’t enough. The main reason is that if you have been ripped off for real, a lawyer likely will not take your case if you only have a WGA registration but no copyright. See, according to the attorneys, you are only entitled to statutory damages and attorney’s fees in a proceeding if you have copyright. Without that, the upside is not there for them (especially since they’ll often take these types of cases on contingency). The only recourse you have then is WGA arbitration. However, that will most likely not net you any money, because the only power the WGA has is to punish the producer by, for example, preventing them and/or their company from producing a signatory film and/or working with guild members until they pay you. That is, if arbitration finds in your favor.

The takeaway here is: always copyright your script. All WGA registration does is prove that a certain draft was sent to the WGA on a certain date, but it has no legal weight. To copyright your scripts, go to the official US government site (and beware of third parties scammers who will do this for you for a fee):

https://www.copyright.gov/regi…

To summarize: no, plagiarism isn’t something that happens all the time. Yes, you need to protect yourself. Do so by copyrighting your work before sending it out. And sure, if you want to register it at the WGA as well, can’t hurt.

One last thing. Please do NOT watermark your script. All this does is tell prospective producers that you may be neurotic or paranoid and send them running. Being a screenwriter means you must expose your material to third parties, and that does involve a certain amount of risk.

Similarly, absolutely do get your work copyrighted, but do NOT indicate such on your cover page. This says “amateur” and tells the industry that you may not be ready for the bigs. Leave it off there, and be confident that if your idea does get stolen, it may well be because your career is taking off and you’re meeting a lot of people and pitching your ideas to decision-makers — and that, friends, is a great place to be!