PRESS RELEASE

January 2, 2003

Attorney Garon Authors The Independent Filmmaker's Law and Business Guide

CONCORD, N.H. - Jon Garon, of counsel at Gallagher, Callahan & Gartrell and professor at Franklin Pierce Law Center, is the author of the recently published Independent Filmmaker's Law and Business Guide: Financing, Shooting, and Distributing Independent and Digital Films. The book serves as a guide for filmmakers, film students, and lawyers interested in entertainment law.

The book explains how to acquire film rights from books, plays or other sources, how to create the filmmaker’s motion picture company to finance and develop the film, and how to operate as the employer of dozens of skilled professionals, including actors, designers, cinematographers, and others. The book reviews the laws of copyright, defamation, and trademark to steer the filmmaker clear of the many pitfalls that may make the completed film impossible to sell or exhibit. The book also provides detailed explanation of the many contracts needed during the course of the filmmaking, including submission agreements, location agreements, employment contracts, financing arrangements, film distribution agreements, and union contracts.

" The principles are relevant to short films, student projects and large-scale productions alike,"said Garon. "This book is written as a 'legal & business guide' because making a movie, even a small-budget, backyard production, is a long process of negotiating and signing contracts; complying with labor, health, safety, and revenue codes; recognizing and protecting the rights of artists, writers, musicians, performers, bystanders and others; and becoming a specialist in dozens of areas of business and law in a matter of weeks."

Garon, a resident of Bow, is an attorney with the law firm of Gallagher, Callahan & Gartrell in Concord, New Hampshire and a professor at Franklin Pierce Law Center, one of the country’s leading law schools for Intellectual Property Law. Professor Garon practices and teaches in the areas of Copyright, Entertainment Law, Free Speech, Internet Regulation and Technology Licensing and continues to represent screenwriters, directors and film producers. Professor Garon has been elected as chairperson of the New Hampshire Film Commission.

Gallagher Callahan & Gartrell is a full service, multidisciplinary law firm offering services to clients in New Hampshire and New England.

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