It didn’t take long for this blog to feature Paris Hilton. The hotel heiress’s right-of-publicity lawsuit against Hallmark Cards for depicting her as a waitress (image left, click to enlarge) is getting interesting. The defense has filed a scathing response in the form of a motion to dismiss that accuses the well-known socialite and frequent litigator of attempting to squelch a First Amendment-protected parody.
“Paris Whitney Hilton is the stereotypical ubiquitous ‘household name’ public figure,” says the anti-SLAPP motion written Lincoln Bandlow of Spillane Shaeffer Aronoff Bandlow in Century City, and “the subject of numerous parodies, commentaries, editorials and discussions. It is exactly one such parody that Hilton seeks to suppress.”
The Hallmark card in question depicts Hilton as a waitress serving a male customer with a plate of food. “Don’t touch that, it’s hot,” she warns him. When he asks, “What’s hot?” she replies with her catchphrase, “That’s hot.” According to Hilton’s complaint, the card misappropriates her name and likeness and violates her trademark in the phrase “That’s hot.”
The card, according to the motion, is “not only entertainment and parody, but also social commentary and criticism of Hilton’s lifestyle and belief system.”
A hearing on the motion is set Dec. 3 before U.S. District Judge Percy Anderson in Los Angeles.
