A $10 million lawsuit has been filed against NBA All-Star Lebron James, rapper Drake and entertainment mogul Future (Drizzy’s partner) over the rights of their new hockey documentary title, “Black Ice.”
According to the NY Post, the former head of the NBA Players Association, Billy Hunter, recently filed the claim in Manhattan state Supreme Court.
Listed in the filing are The Springhill Company and Uninterrupted Canada, Dreamcrew Entertainment, Stryker Indigo and First Take Entertainment, a film production company.
The lawsuit comes days before the documentary, directed by the Academy Award-nominated director Hubert Davis, is set to debut at the Toronto International Film Festival on Saturday, September 10th.
Hunter, 79, alleges he is the only one with exclusive legal rights to produce any film about the Colored Hockey League of the Maritimes, a sporting organization that existed for 35 years between 1895 to the 1930s.
The former federal prosecutor is suing the three not only for $10 million but is seeking to participate in the profits from the documentary.
The complaint says, “While the defendants LeBron James, Drake, and Maverick Carter [LeBron’s business partner] are internationally known and renowned in their respective fields of basketball and music, it does not afford them the right to steal another’s intellectual property.”
He believes James and Drake, whose real name is Aubrey Graham, cut a deal behind his back with the authors of “Black Ice: The Lost History of the Colored Hockey League of the Maritimes, 1895 to 1925,” George and Darril Fosty.
He also has listed them on the lawsuit, as Hunter reportedly paid the Fostys $265,000 for the movie rights. The Fostys believed Hunter only had the rights to a scripted project, not a documentary.
“A documentary is still a ‘motion picture’ and an ‘audiovisual adaptation’ and any claim to the contrary is absurd and made in bad faith,” Hutcher explains in the suit, suggesting James paid the Fostys six figures to breach their contract with him.
“The Uninterrupted defendants paid those sums to induce the Authors to breach their Agreement with Plaintiff.”
Now, they will see each other in court.
Hunter said, “I don’t think they believed the property rights would be litigated. They thought I would go away. They gambled.”
Reps for James, Drake, and the Fostys and their firms have not commented.