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Larry Zerner has made a comfortable living over the past few years as an entertainment lawyer, arguing cases in the courtroom over copyright infringements and litigation fees. However, for horror fans, he will forever be known for supplying Crystal Lake's resident slasher with his most iconic symbol: his hockey mask. No doubt, one of the FRIDAY THE 13TH's most popular characters, Zerner's performance as the aloof prankster Shelley has been beloved by the franchise's loyal followers. Aside from convention appearances, Zerner has also provided commentary on the film in the CRYSTAL LAKE TO MANHATTAN FRIDAY box set. On this Friday the 13th nearly twenty five years to the day FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 3 was released, Mr. Zerner stopped by the Crypt to discuss the impact of the film all these years later, the significance of the film in 3D, and talks in detail on his entertainment law career, and an insight into the business side of this bloody industry.
COLONEL'S CRYPT: Hello Larry and Happy Friday The 13th to you. LARRY ZERNER: Thanks, and same to you. CC: We are in the 25th anniversary of FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 3D and I wanted to ask you how has the impact been for you all these years later? LZ: Impact is a strong word. In my day to day, it's not something that part of it because I'm a lawyer now. People don't really know about the film where I work, but then a couple of times a month I get someone asking for an autograph through my e-mail address or my Myspace page. It's interesting that something you did 25 years ago can still cause people to react in a positive way. If you're a plumber, nobody comes to you 25 years later and says "That toilet you installed, great job!" For an actor, you get that sort of attention which is gratifying but you realize it's nice. The conventions I've been to has always been a blast. It's been great, everything's been nice, and it's a lot of fun. I didn't really have much of an acting career but I had this one thing: I gave Jason his hockey mask. I had a lot of friends who are actors and they're still struggling. You ask them what they've been and they'll tell you stuff that nobody will recognize. Now you tell someone you gave Jason a hockey mask, they all know what it means. That 25 years later it still has some cultural relevance is pretty amazing. LZ: We'll see what happens when HALLOWEEN reboots. CC: That's going to be very interesting, cause I think that's going to cause other franchises to restart. LZ: I know they wanted to remake FRIDAY THE 13TH. I know Michael Bay for a while was in talks to buy the rights for the first one. What I heard was that he's talking about remaking it and said "Then we'll put the hockey mask" and someone had to go "Michael, there is no hockey mask in the first one." WHAT? CC: There's not even much of Jason in that one (laughs). LZ: In order for Jason to get the hockey mask, you'd have to remake PART 3 otherwise, you know (laughs). CC: I know a few fans I've spoken to have said to take the first four and merge them into one. I don't know about that. LZ: You really can't remake the first one, because what people want is Jason, and there is no Jason in FRIDAY THE 13TH. It's not a Jason movie. If they're going to remake it, if you bring back the history of his mother, you have to go to Paramount, who owns the rights. It's a rights issue of which movie are you remaking, because each movie has a separate fee. CC: You are a lawyer now where you have your firm Zerner Law. Where did you begin an interest in becoming an entertainment lawyer and how did you wind up opening your own practice? LZ: Well the acting thing wasn't really working and I wasn't sure what to do. My father who was a lawyer told me if I went to law school, he would pay for it. At the time, I was thinking of producing, but I figured I'd go to law school because I wanted to do something. I always wanted to do something in the entertainment world so when I got out into the field, I worked at a law firm that did entertainment law. I did copyright and litigation. I left that firm seven years ago last week. I've just been doing copyright, trademark, and entertainment law. I really like it. My clients have been great. I've worked with some really interesting people and on some great cases. I love it. CC: On a day by day basis, what do you do as a lawyer? LZ: There's two different sides to lawyer. One thing I do is I look at contracts for writers, directors, and producers. I help negotiate them and usually they come with a contract they've been handed that they want a lawyer to look at to figure out what's fair and how the terms are going to be worded. I help starting producers and writers on that. I also do litigation which is where somebody's stolen a script and I'll go to the studio and try to get money for the writer, or writers having trouble with an agent. They'll hire me to try to work out a deal. CC: One of the clients you've represented was George Lutz, who's no longer with us. Being an Amityville native with an interest in Mr. Lutz's story, what did you represent him on? LZ: I represented George in a lawsuit when the remake of AMITYVILLE HORROR came out in 2005. It was alleging that the movie defamed him because in the movie the character portrayed by Ryan Reynolds is this shotgun wielding maniac that wasn't in the book. It was something made up. So the issue was whether they had the right to portray him that way in the remake. He also had a contract with Dimension, who was a co-producer of the movie that owed him money for a sequel they were going to do that never got made. It was a defamation case and a breach of contract case. CC: One of your clients is Monster Mania, a convention. How do you represent them? LZ: I helped Dave Hagan who runs it, I helped him with some trademark matters. I have gone as a guest and I really enjoy Monster Mania. Dave is an uber fan of his own and it's a labor of love on his part, and he really tries to make it as fan friendly as possible. FANGORIA WEEKEND OF HORRORS are good but they focus more on films that are coming out. They don't focus on films of the past. Sometimes they do but they focus more on films that are coming out. Dave really goes out and brings the stars from past movies and does bring in huge panels. When I was there last August, he had about seventeen FRIDAY THE 13TH stars, and for the first time every Jason was there. Dana Kimmell was there for her first convention. Kimberly Beck was there for her first convention. It was a lot of fun. CC: Do you enjoy the convention circuit? LZ: It's a lot of fun but I don't do it a lot. I've only done two. It's not something that I have time to do with my law career. I'm not the type of character who gets bombarded by autograph seekers. I went to Monster Mania because it was a FRIDAY THE 13TH emphasis. The FRIDAY THE 13TH fans would be there so I went there. For other conventions, I just don't go. I am going in October to Spooky Empire in Orlando because they are doing a special tribute to FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 3. It's me, Richard Brooker, Catherine Parks (Vera) in her first convention, Harry Manfredini. Some other people they are working on and you can find out more at www.25yearsofterror.com on October 19-21. CC: Is that your only convention appearance this year? LZ: Well someone had told me that they were going to do a screening in 3D in New York sometime in August but I haven't heard from him in a while so I'm not sure that that's going on. We just heard that in Los Angeles at the Egyptian Theatre, the American Cinematechque. They want to do a FRIDAY THE 13TH weekend, the weekend of October 12. I will be there along with probably other cast members. Whenever I hear about these things, I call the other cast members and say "come on down." It's still being worked out and you can check out the info at www.americancinematechque.com in about a month ago. CC: About the screening, which will be in 3D, you feel that if you haven't seen the movie in 3D, then you haven't seen it at all. LZ: Oh it's so true. For fans of the series who've only seen it on DVD, I've seen it on DVD and it's not so great because some shots don't make any sense because it's not in 3D. You see the rat come out, the snake, the pitchfork, the yo yo, and you're going "What is this, oh that's supposed to be in 3D," but when you see it in 3D you go "That's so cool." It was a brand new system at the time. It was a step up. They used polarized glasses, like what you see now at IMAX theaters. It is just a much better 3D system and looks great. If you ever have a chance to see it in 3D and you're a fan, it's much more fun. You'll go "This is what the movie is all about." When you see it with a crowd and things are coming out off the screen, it's so much fun. It's a group participation movie at that point. CC: I have to see it on 3D before I die. LZ: It's difficult because you need a special projector and a special screen to view it. There has to be a silver screen, not a regular screen in a theater. CC: You've also been on a couple of game shows as well, recently appearing on 1 VS. 100. How did that come about? LZ: That was kind of fluky. I was on WHO WANTS TO BE A MILLIONAIRE back about six years ago. I didn't get in the hot seat but I had a great time. My memory retains a lot of trivia stuff. My nephew said "You should go on this show 1 VS. 100" and I haven't seen it. I went to the website and saw how the show works and felt I could do that. I looked to see if I could become a contestant and about an hour before I did my Google search, they had posted an ad on Craigslist that they were looking for contestants which was going to happen the next day. My nephew tells me, the next day I look, and the day after that I audition. I just thought I would be a mob member and win some money. For those who haven't seen the show, if the contestant loses, any remaining mob members pick up his money. If there's $100,000 in the pot and there are ten members left, they get $10,000. So I thought that'd be fun. I auditioned for the show and they'll take anybody because they film two shows and they need 200 people. For my show, they did something different, which was a "Last Man Standing" format. They would start with a hundred people and they would ask questions until there's only one person left. I'm thinking "I can do this." When I get there for the taping, I see Ken Jennings, who won all those days on JEOPARDY. There's the guy who beat Ken Jennings on SUPER JEOPARDY. I see some guys from WHO WANTS TO BE A MILLIONAIRE, poker player Annie Duke, and a couple of rocket scientists. I was cannon fodder in that mob. I just sat there and answering questions. People kept dropping out and there was five of us. The question came who was married the most number of times, King Henry VIII, Michael Jackson, or Larry King. The other four went with King Henry VIII and I went with Larry King. I was right and I won $250,000. (Click here for video of Larry's winning moment on 1 VS. 100) CC: I wanted to talk if I can about your website, Zernerlaw.com. On your website, you can subscribe to a report you send out. What is in these reports and how do you subscribe to it? LZ: The Zerner Law Report is semi-regularly that I try to get out every few months. It's stories about interesting legal matters and tips for writers and people in the entertainment industry about legal things they should know. You can see past issues on my websites, such as "Ten legal tips every screenwriter should know" and "what you need to know about a collaboration agreement," things like that. To subscribe, you just send an e-mail with the heading "Subscribe" to me at larry@zernerlaw.com. CC: How important is it for screenwriters to know about copyright infringement? LZ: Oh, don't get me started (laughs). If there's one thing a screenwriter has to know, it's that they have to register their scripts with the Copyright Office, NOT the Writer's Guild. The Writer's Guild is really a waste of their money. There's a whole article on my website where you can find the differences between the two. If you write a script, before you send it out, you have to register it with the Copyright Office, which is www.copyright.gov. I believe this month they are starting online registration. You no longer have to print it out and mail it in. Now you can e-mail it in. They lowered the price to $35 so there's no excuse. First of all it's required before you sue someone for infringement, but more importantly if you want to get attorney's fees in a lawsuit for copyright infringement, you have to have registered with the copyright office before the infringement began. I get calls all the time from screenwriters who say "I want to sue these people because they call my script." I ask if they register it. "Well, only at the Writer's Guild" would be the response, and the bottom line is that if you didn't register it with the Copyright Office, you can't get attorney's fees at the end of the day. You also can't get statutory damages which is when you hear about people getting $150,000 for every act of infringement. The only way you can get those is if you registered before the infringement began. It doesn't begin when the movie comes out, it begins when the guy writes that script that infringes on your script. If you want to know one thing, it's to register it with the Copyright Office. Also, keep track of every person you send your script to. However you do it, keep a record because the other thing you have to prove in a copyright infringement suit is not just it's the same or substantially similar to your script, but that they had access to your script. If you can't prove the person who stole it had access through a producer or studio, then you're not going to win. It's important to keep who you send it to. It doesn't have to be a fancy record, but you should have a record, a cover letter or something like that. The problem with writers not registering with the Copyright Office is that it costs them hundreds of thousands of dollars sometimes in these lawsuits. They register with the Writer's Guild and they think it's safe. That registration lasts only five years. I've had cases where we're suing ten or fifteen years after the work was stolen. It takes them that long before they actually use it, then they don't have any proof of registration, whereas you register it at the Copyright Office, the registration lasts forever. CC: Thanks for your time Larry. LZ: You're welcome and if I hear more about the New York screening, I'll let you know. CC: Awesome, take care.
LZ: Bye.
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