Warner Bros. blocks a fan's Potter-themed dinner party

[Batman713]

If you’re planning to host a Halloween dinner this weekend and sell tickets online, you might want to check with your lawyers first. A Harry Potter fan in the U.K. who calls herself Ms. Marmite Lover was planning to host Potter-themed dinners this Saturday and Sunday — complete with butterbeer, pumpkin pasties, and Dumbledore’s favorite sweets (mint humbugs and sherbet lemons) — until she received a cease-and-desist letter last Friday from Warner Bros. suggesting that her “proposed use of the Harry Potter properties…without our consent would amount to an infringement of Warner’s rights,” according to the London Telegraph. The biggest problem for the legal team at the studio: Ms. Marmite Lover was selling tickets online for her event, making it commercial and not charitable in nature. But as the offending hostess explained in the Guardian, “My living room holds under 30 people, this is hardly some cynical money spinning exercise – at a maximum of £25 a head I won’t make a profit, I’ll be struggling to cover the costs of the ingredients and props I’ve shelled out on, such as dry ice and miracle berries.” (A rep for Warner — which is, like Entertainment Weekly, a division of Time Warner — had no comment.)

Ms. Marmite Lover, a 40-year-old single mom who’s been running occasional “underground restaurant” events in her home since January, has since renamed this weekend’s event “Generic Wizard Night.” And now she’s struggling to come up with a new menu. Pumpkin pasties pre-date J.K. Rowling’s best-selling series, so those are still safe, but not her version of a clear Rowling invention like butterbeer.

http://shelf-life.ew.com/2009/10/27/harry-potter-lawyer-dinner-party/

 

[Lunar_Wolf]

 

[Ugfugly]

she's not a fan she's hosting an event and charging for it

 

[katie_girl09]

^Exactly.
It would be different if she were just hosting a party and inviting people to it for free. The fact that she is charging for it means that she is making money off of something that is not her idea. They have the right to stop her.

 

[Aesop Rocks]

Here's me losing sleep over it.

 

[NotAHenchwench]

She would have been fine if she hadn't advertised it. Asking friends to donate money to cover costs is completely fine... she was just an idiot about it.

 

[katie_girl09]

Maybe It's just my cheapness, but I find it hard to believe that she's actually gonna spend 750 pounds on a party for only 30 people. She must have some serious dough to burn if that's true.

 

[NotAHenchwench]

Maybe It's just my cheapness, but I find it hard to believe that she's actually gonna spend 750 pounds on a party for only 30 people. She must have some serious dough to burn if that's true.

I think she was doing it more than once or twice, from the sound of the article.

 

[katie_girl09]

Oops! You're right. Okay, the cost is more understandable.

 

[Lunar_Wolf]

I would of loved if it was a British Harry Potter orgy.

''Come on Ron, tickle me winkie.''

 

[Majic Walrus]

she's not a fan she's hosting an event and charging for it

I agree.

 

[amazingfantasy15]

Who was she inviting, friends or complete strangers? If friends, what kind of witch charges her friends to come over for a party?!?!

 

[C. Lee]

Who was she inviting, friends or complete strangers? If friends, what kind of witch charges her friends to come over for a party?!?!

She must be a Malfoy relative.

 

[terry78]

Draco in leather pants.

 

[Lunar_Wolf]

''Arry, won't you lick me rasher nub!.....Tot it mate!''