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Star Wars Comics history - Some interesting info

Started by Mark 1,

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Mark 1

Mark 1

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I happen to be connected online with Charles Lippincott who was the advertising and Publicity Supervisor on Star Wars (1977).

 

Charles posts some amazing photos and facts from his career (including Star Wars, Alien and Judge Dredd).

 

He recently posted some info about the Star Wars comics and I thought I would share:

 

"I am re-posting another cranky post written for a comic book forum. The reason I am reposting it is because I want you to understand how the merchandising of STAR WARS worked. Before the release of STAR WARS and when it was opened, merchandising rights belonged to 20th Century Fox. The legend that George gave up merchandising rights to make STAR WARS is not true. 20th Century had the rights to merchandise until STAR WARS recouped its cost. As this happened fairly rapidly, the original deal of 20th owning the merchandising rights and ALLOWING us (LFL) to be involved in the deals was a courtesy, not a right. After reaching profit, the terms of the merchandising deal could be re-negotiated. In fact, after reaching profit, the terms of the deal were renegotiated, including ownership of future sequels.

Again, this was posted on another forum to the continue issue of Ed Summer's involvement in the Marvel SW comic books and the issuance of the first SW poster. It's cranky because I'm accused of denigrating Ed's contribution to the comic book world.

 

"I am not concerned with what Ed Summer did or did not do throughout his career, nor am I concerned with what Roy Thomas did either. My intention is not to denigrate what they did or did not do.

 

My intention is to cut through the wildly_fanciful_statement surrounding Marvel Star Wars comics.

First, in Star Wars Comics #1, Roy claims we approached him because George liked Conan. Not true. George may have had dinner with Roy, but George and I picked Howard Chaykin to do the comic book. We hadn't picked a writer. We picked the artist. We wanted Chaykin because of Cody Starbucks.

 

Second, Roy's bit of self promotion in Marvel Comics Issue #1 is just that -- self promotion. We did not pick Roy. What happened was I could not get an impromptu meeting with Stan Lee when I was in NY, so I asked George's gallery partner, Ed Summer, to help set up a meeting with Roy because as the former Editor of Marvel, Roy would know how to get a meeting with Stan. When Roy volunteered to write the comic book, I accepted him because we had no one else in mind, but this was not the same thing as Roy claims -- that George picked him to write the Star Wars Comic Book. All you have to do is read the transcript of our meeting after SDCC to see we were interested in Howie. George remember his name and his artwork. That's saying something.

 

Third, Roy's version of events had been written up in issue #1, and ever since then, it has been used to write up the history of the Marvel Star Wars Comics. The STAR WARS YEAR BY YEAR which came out in 2010 is based on Roy's write ups, as is virtually every other article.

 

Fourth, George Lucas did not have the right to make merchandising deals by himself. There's a reason why the toys and comics book have the 20th Century Fox copyright -- it's because Fox owned a majority share in merchandising. George had residual rights, but he did not fully own the merchandising rights until the film recouped its cost, after which, to secure the sequel rights for STAR WARS, Fox gave up merchandising rights. To understand this sequence, all you have to do is look at the copyright of STAR WARS toys and merchandise along with Box Office records.

 

Five, as a private merchant associated with George, any poster Ed Summer may have produced was not an authorized Star Wars poster because George did not solely own the rights to the use of Star Wars name or its characters' likenesses until the film recouped its cost. Also, by the spring of 1976, the EXCLUSIVE rights for non-theatrical posters was sold to Harry Geissler of Factors, Inc. Just as Marvel had the EXCLUSIVE rights to comic books, so too did FACTORS INC have the exclusive rights to posters. Period. No ifs, ands or buts. Harry Geissler spent a lot of time tracking down pirates who violated his turf because the license cost him a lot of money, and he intended to make back his money. Harry was the one who called the FBI in on pirated material showing up at the Cons.

 

Six, despite these rights being controlled and licensed by 20th Century Fox, there were a lot of attempts by pirates to produce STAR WARS merchandise, including this T-shirt below. There were a lot of lawyers involved with dealing with pirates because STAR WARS was so lucrative a franchise. We had a direct line to the FBI for dealing with pirates. I'm not kidding here. This is how seriously we took copyright, license and merchandise."

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Chip Cataldo

Chip Cataldo

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I'm also friends with Charles. Isn't he just awesome, Marc? I hate how he was screwed out of money, but he seems to not be as bitter about it as I would be. :) The wealth of information he shares about Star Wars, Alien and Jugde Dredd is just mind-boggling.

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Mark 1

Mark 1

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I happen to be connected online with stalk Charles Lippincott who was the advertising and Publicity Supervisor on Star Wars (1977).

 

What are you talking about?

 

 

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Mark 1

Mark 1

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I'm also friends with Charles. Isn't he just awesome, Marc? I hate how he was screwed out of money, but he seems to not be as bitter about it as I would be. :) The wealth of information he shares about Star Wars, Alien and Jugde Dredd is just mind-boggling.

 

I agree, he is definitely a character. lol

 

His info on those movies is amazing.

 

 

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