A New Direction

Well, my efforts to obtain the visual rights to Ms. Day's book THE LITTLE PROFESSOR OF PINEY WOODS have officially failed. Although she had expressed by email that she would very much support a project like this being made, negotiations with her agent revealed not only that my meager development monies and good intentions wouldn't hold much sway in the business-world, but also that the visual rights to her book were never owned by her in the first place. Apparently she only retained the COPYrights in her original deal with the publisher, not any visual rights. That publisher has since been bought out by a very MAJOR publisher who probably won't give me the time of day if I were to try to pursue this option any further.

So what does this mean for WHEN COTTON BLOSSOMS, you ask? Good question... but fortunately, the answer is clear. Laurence Jones is a historical figure, so a movie based on his LIFE would not violate the rights of his biographers (Ms. Day's book is one of several others). Legally speaking, as long as the film doesn't steal any dialogue, descriptions, or structure directly from one of these books, then it will not be in violation of any visual rights of the authors.

Ms. Day's book is what originally attracted me to the story of Laurence Jones' life, so for that reason, I'm disappointed with this result. But in a sense, this gives me a new direction... the freedom to tell his story like it's never been told before. And that's a truly exciting notion.