연출저작권 인정 여부에 관한 고찰

Abstract

A director of the musical or theater is the person responsible for the all element of a performance. But the copyrights of the musical or theater director is not protected by the Korean Copyrights Act. First of all terms of copyright, the term “work” means a creative production that expresses human thoughts and emotions and the term “author” means a person who creates a work. The right of the director of the musical or theater is regulated as a performer not an author. According to the Copyrights Act §2②, the term “performer” means a person who gives a stage performance by expressing works through acting, dancing, musical playing, singing, narrating, reciting or other artistic means or by expressing things other than works in a similar way, including a person who conducts, directs or supervises a stage performance. Thus a director of the musical or theater is a performer and the rights of the director is protected as the neighboring copyright. But the director who contribute their thinking and insights to play or musical performance might contribute creatively to a production is protected as the copyright. A theater production or a musical production can be broken into two parts, the words on the page and the work on stage. The directors right about the work on stage shall be protected as the writers right about the words on the page can be protected. The current copyright statutes seem easily to accommodate co-authorship. A director’s copyright would instigate a complex, cumbersome array of derivative copyrights that would stymie and ultimately prevent multiple productions of a playwright’s script.