Copyright © Protection

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'The condition of endless waiting is one that modern American playwrights share . . .. Don't spend your life waiting. You may not be an actor, but that doesn't mean that action is forbidden you. Playwrights can, with very little expense, mount readings of their work; they can band together with other playwrights for readings and discussions; and they can, if they want to, produce their work themselves.'

-- Tony Kushner

The good news is that nobody steals unproduced plays in this business. Or maybe somebody has, but it's hard to find a case of that happening in the last 30 years. But for Screenplays, assume the rip-off rate rivals Porsches in Los Angeles [even if it's not really that bad]. The theatre is still a very civilized business, but it's a good idea to help keep it that way. So always include the copyright notice on your Title Page. Here's the proper form of the notice . . .

Your work as a playwright is protected the moment the words leave your fingers and hit the paper. That's the gist of the U.S. Copyright law now. Technically, you don't have to do anything but write your plays to have protection.

Whether you should also formally file for a Certificate of Registration for your work with the U.S. Copyright Office is up to you.

Legal Eagle types strongly recommend getting a formal Certificate of Registration. It's easy to do, but is probably not worth the $20 fee until a theatre has committed to producing your play. If you have the cash, go to it. If you're strapped, play the odds: you're probably better off spending the $20 on duplicating and mailing your plays to theatres and competitions.

Here's more than you need to know about getting a Certificate of Registration from . . .

The U.S. Copyright OfficeHere's the quick way through the maze [remember this is government work]: Under the General Information heading on the homepage, click on Registration Procedures. Then under the Performing Arts heading, click on Dramatic Works . . . the link goes directly there, but that page won't allow you to get anywhere else in the site, not even to the mailing address you'll need.

Word processing tip: You need the © in the copyright notice on the Title page of your manuscript. Nearly all word processing programs can create this through the Symbol menu, often under the Insert menu. If your program can't do this -- or if you're a Neo-Luddite using one of those things we dimly remember called a typewriter -- try faking it with (c). Technically, you should connect the tops and bottoms of the parentheses around the c, but a number of playwrights just leave it as is.

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