German Court: No bonus for dubbing actor if film becomes blockbuster

A peculiar case of copyright law is now pending before judges in Germany. The German law on copyright has a “blockbuster” provision, that provides for a so-called “fairness compensation” in cases where there is a disproportion between the fee paid to authors and the subsequent success of the work.

An interesting question is whether a dubbing actor can be entitled to such an additional compensation. In Germany, popular movies in the English language are often dubbed into German. Die Suddeutsche Zeitung now reports on a claim for additional compensation brought by German "dubbing actor" Marcus Off, who lent his voice to Johnny Depp for the German language version of Pirates of the Caribbean.

Marcus Off was paid 18,000 Euros to be Johnny Depp’s German voice-over in the famous film sequels. However, after his work was done, the movies became absolute blockbusters and raised much more money than envisaged. Mr Off took the view that his fee was not a fair compensation for his contribution: as the German voice of the lead actor he had made a decisive contribution and should be paid a supplemental fee of 180,000 Euros.

The Berlin Court found that it is possible to declare an actor’s fee disproportionate to the success of a film, this was not the case here. The court established that a dubbing artist, who lends his voice to a lead actor, has no claim for a supplemental fee as “fairness compensation”, as the dubbing actor's actual contribution is of merely ancillary importance to the film. Indeed the ‘voice-over’ is not an interpreter himself and basically adds a sound effect to the lead actors performance. An actor in itself has allready a secondary form of copyright, namely a performer’s right. (§79.2.UrhG).

Although a theoretical possibility of a succesful claim based on article 32a remains open for (dubbing) actors, the court held that Mr. Off’s contribution to the films was not insubstantial but certainly covered by the fee already paid by Disney, the film production company. Although it is understandable that the voice-over artist got frustrated when he saw Disney’s income skyrocket, I think the court did the right thing. If this claim was awarded, what would the costume designers think? Mr Off still does not agree with me and has recently announced that he will appeal against this decision.

References: The IPkat; edubbing blog;  Articles 79.2.2 and 32a of the German Copyright Act (UrhG); Berliner Kammergericht (case reference 24 U 2/10 of 29 June 2011)