France’S Highest Courtroom Rules Inwards Favor Of Liberty Of Aspect Of Manager Over Heirs’ Droit Moral

Readers of this weblog may remember that the Paris Court of Appeals institute inward Oct 2015 that the staging of the opera Le Dialogue des Carmélites past times Dmitry Chernyakov for the Munich Opera inward 2010 violated the moral rights of composer too librettist Francis Poulenc, which adapted the eponymous theatrical play past times Georges Bernanos.

Le Dialogue des Carmélites tells the storey of French aristocrat Blanche de la Force who decides to locomote into the Carmelite Convent, perhaps to hold upwardly sheltered from life, every bit she is fearful too shy. The French Revolution upset her footing too the Carmelites must exit the convent. Blanche leaves the congregation to render to her family. When the Carmelites are arrested too sentenced to boot the bucket past times the revolutionary tribunal, Blanche returns to them every bit they are each climbing the steps to the guillotine, too she is the in conclusion i to receive got her caput cutting off.

Dmitry Chernyakov had non modified the grade or the dialogue. However, his interpretation did non accept house during the French revolution, but inward contemporary time. In the in conclusion scene, the Carmelites are locked upwardly inward a shed total of explosives. Blanche appears on the scene too pulls them all out to safety, i past times one. She so comes dorsum to the shed which explodes, killing her, an apparent suicide.

The heirs of both Francis Poulenc too Georges Bernanos had sued Dmitry Chernyakov too the Munich Opera, claiming a violation of their moral rights, which are which are perpetual too transferable upon boot the bucket nether Article L. 121-1 of the French intellectual belongings code. The Paris Court of Appeals had ruled inward their favor, finding that the scenography profoundly modified the in conclusion scene too distorted its spirit. The DVD of the play could no longer hold upwardly sold.

The manager too the Opera took the instance to the Cour de cassation, France’s highest civil court. The heirs argued inward defence that “if a sure liberty tin hold upwardly recognized for the manager to surgical operation his work, this liberty is limited past times the moral correct of the writer to the honor of the integrity too spirit of his work, which must non hold upwardly denatured.”

But the Cour de cassation just ‘broke’ this holding on June 22. The Court reasoned that the Paris Court of appeals had noted that “the contested staging did non alteration the dialogue, absent inward this business office of the preexisting work, nor the music, fifty-fifty going so far every bit to reproduce, along amongst the religious songs, the audio of the guillotine which rhythms, inward the Francis Poulenc opera,  each death, too that the goal of the story, every bit staged too described past times Dmitry Chernyakov, respected the themes of hope, of martyrdom, of grace too transfer of grace too of the communion of saints love to the authors of the master copy work, [and that therefore] the Court of appeals did non describe the legal consequences of its ain findings too violated [article L. 113-4 of the French intellectual belongings code.]”

Article L.113-4 of the French intellectual belongings code states that “[t]he composite operate is the belongings of the writer who created it, dependent plain to the rights of the writer of the pre-existing work.”

In our case, the staging of the opera is a composite work, dependent plain indeed to the rights of the authors of the pre-existing work, the opera. Such rights include moral rights. But the staging, every bit a composite work, is also a operate on its own, protected past times article L. 113-4. Since it does non infringe on the rights of the authors of the master copy work, their rights had non been violated.

This ruling is non surprising, every bit the Cour de cassation had held on May 15, 2015, that a Court of Appeals must explicate “in a concrete fashion how searching for the correct residue betwixt the rights [of the writer of the master copy operate too the rights of the writer of the composite work] justified the judgement it had pronounced.”

The Cour de cassation also cited Article 10, § 2, of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights too Fundamental Freedoms. Protecting liberty of expression, to notice that the Court of appeals erred inward forbidding the sale of the DVDs of the opera too its broadcast, because it should receive got examined “what inward the search for a fair residue betwixt the director's liberty of creation too the protection of the moral rights of the composer too the writer of the libretto justified the prohibition club it ordered.”

The Versailles Court of Appeals volition non review the instance i time to a greater extent than too volition probable dominion inward favor of the director, too thus save his liberty to practise too to limited himself. Moral rights are oft viewed inward the U.S. every bit a agency to censor creativity, too the 2015 Paris Court of appeals ruling for sure provided grounds for this view.