quarterempty

The Criterion Contraption: #12: This Is Spinal Tap

It took Spinal Tap years to find out who owned the rights to the band name before their 1992 tour; Embassy and Monarch films were long gone and as part of their deal with Embassy, they’d sold away all rights to the characters. It’s still not really clear who owned them when–the Criterion DVD has New Line Home Video’s logo, but MGM did the most recent DVD. Anyway, as part of some Byzantine licensing scheme, the members of Spinal Tap are allowed to use the characters now, but only if they appear as Spinal Tap at least once every three years. If they don’t, the rights revert. So they literally have to play a concert, or make a television appearance, or something, every three years, or they can never be Spinal Tap again.

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