Game Faces: Sport Celebrity and the Laws of Reputation (Sport and Society)

Game Faces: Sport Celebrity and the Laws of Reputation (Sport and Society)

Sports figures cope with a level of celebrity once reserved for the stars of stage and screen. In Game Faces , Sarah K. Fields looks at the legal ramifications of the cases brought by six of them--golfer Tiger Woods, quarterback Joe Montana, college football coach Wally Butts, baseball pitchers Warren Spahn and Don Newcombe, and hockey enforcer Tony Twist--when faced with what they considered attacks on their privacy and image. Placing each case in its historical and legal context, Fields examines how sports figures in the U.S. have used the law to regain control of their image. As she shows, decisions in the cases significantly affected the evolution of laws related to privacy, defamation, and publicity--areas pertinent to the lives of the famous sports figure and the non-famous consumer alike. She also tells the stories of why the plaintiffs sought relief in the courts, uncovering motives that delved into the heart of issues separating individual rights from the public's perceived right to know. A fascinating exploration of a still-evolving phenomenon, Game Faces is an essential look at the legal playing fields that influence our enjoyment of sports. “Recommended."-- Choice   "Sarah Fields' work on the history of sports and law dispels all doubt about the legitimacy of sports law as a field of study. Game Faces presents a convincing argument that cases about sports have made unique and important contributions to the law of privacy and free speech."--Erin Buzuvis, Western New England University "Sarah Fields combines her talents as a historian and a lawyer to guide us to and through the intersection of sport, celebrity, and the law. The precision and depth of this study is a gift to all interested in the rights of privacy and the control of one's public image."--Richard C. Crepeau, author of NFL Football: A History of America's New National Pastime " Game Faces is unique, effective, and impressive. I learned a great deal from it and appreciate how Fields addresses some complicated legal and ethical issues. Although most of us are not celebrities, many people in many disciplines will profit from considering the tension between the media and the freedom they are provided by the First Amendment and the personal autonomy of famous people to control (and profit from) their names, images, and likenesses. In part because we live in a celebrity obsessed culture, many readers should find Game Faces enlightening."--Daniel A. Nathan, author of Saying It's So: A Cultural History of the Black Sox Scandal " Game Faces marks an important contribution to the field that is sure to shape and generate further discussion of the links between sport, law, identity, and power."-- Journal of Sport History "This is an excellent book that clearly exhibits the painstaking research that went into this thought-provoking subject."-- International Journal of Sport Communication Sarah K. Fields is an associate professor in communication at the University of Colorado—Denver. She is the author of Female Gladiators: Gender, Law, and Contact Sport in America . Game Faces Sport Celebrity and the Laws of Reputation By Sarah K. Fields UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS PRESS Copyright © 2016 Sarah K. Fields All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-252-08173-6 Contents Acknowledgments, xi, Preface, xv, 1 The History of Celebrity and the Laws of Reputation and Speech, 1, 2 Lies, Libel, and Football: Coaches as Public Figures Butts v. Curtis Publishing (1967), 19, 3 Stop the Press: A Baseball Legend and Biography Spahn v. Julian Messner, Inc. (1967), 43, 4 Super Bowl Icon or Marketing Tool? Montana v. San Jose Mercury News (1995), 61, 5 Owning a Face: Publicity and Advertising Newcombe v. Coors Brewing (1998), 81, 6 Art versus Image: The First Amendment versus the Right of Publicity ETW v. Jireh Publishing (2000), 101, 7 What's in a Name? Comic Books and Hockey Doe v. TCI Cablevision (2003), 119, Conclusion, 139, Notes, 149, Index, 181, CHAPTER 1 THE HISTORY OF CELEBRITY AND THE LAWS OF REPUTATION AND SPEECH Celebrities and the media have a complex relationship. Both need the other to maintain their status: being a celebrity of significant stature without any media attention in the twenty-first century is difficult, if not impossible. At the same time, in our "Peeping Tom society" the public seems fascinated by stories about celebrities. As legal scholar Lawrence A. Friedman argued, the twenty-first century has pushed the bounds of what has historically been considered personal information, of interest only to the person and close friends and family. In today's society, very little is viewed as being off limits to the media when it comes to the lives of celebrities. Thus, media of all sorts have chosen to capitalize on the public interest in celebrities by giving us what we want, because almost all Americans in this modern world consume and retain information about celebrities, whether we want to or not. Th