If you loosely base a screenplay, novel, short story, etc. on a true story do you have to clear the rights from the family? An example of what I'm talking about is Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door. It's a fictional account of the same story as " An American Crime". American Crime used the same names and everything but Jack Ketchum didn't. What are the rules for something like that?
shareAnyone have an idea?
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That is a bit of a broad question. The reason you see Based on _____ for biographies because the writers have a lot of facts in an organized creative non-fiction manner.
But generally, you do not need direct permission to do a story on someone's life. Or if you do complete research on your own, you can create your own on it. But most movies, and usually Execs insist on making some changes, such as a different time period to avoid any possible legal standings.
Thanks for the reply. That helped a lot.
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