Mattel didn’t steal the idea for reality competition show The Toy Box from a producer, who accused the company of ripping off his concept for an identical series that he pitched, a jury has found.
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The decision comes after a 10-week trial in Santa Monica that touched on standards for protectable ideas and when a company can be on the hook for moving forward with a concept independently pitched by multiple producers. In a verdict that could discourage other creators from suing over idea theft, a 12-person jury on Thursday rejected Norton Herrick’s bid for more than $46 million in lost profits he sought to claw back from Mattel.
Back in 2014, Herrick said he pitched the idea for Playmakers , an unscripted show featuring inventors who pitch their toys to child judges, with the goal of reaching the finale. The winner receives a cash prize and a contract with Mattel for production and distribution of that toy.
Herrick sued after the company produced a similar concept in The Toy Box , which ran on ABC for two seasons in 2017. He alleged breach of implied contract, fraud and trade secret misappropriation, claiming that Mattel strung him along by lying about its continued interest in his pitch to prevent him from bringing the idea to competitors before it could release its version of the show.
Thursday’s verdict indicates that jurors agreed with Herrick that he entered into a contract with Mattel but not that it breached that deal. They also rejected arguments that the information disclosed to the company was novel and confidential, or that it constituted trade secrets.
In the 10-week trial, Mattel’s defense revolved, in part, around arguments that the concept for Playmakers was generic. Larry Iser, a lawyer for the toy giant, told the jury that the idea was “commonplace” and “floating around in the television and the toy industries for years,” according to a transcript of proceedings.
In 2014, for instance, another producer presented a deck to Mattel for a similar reality show called The Toy Job . The company got several pitches for the same idea, many of which came the same year Herrick was in talks with Mattel executives for his show.
Producers for The Toy Box denied ever receiving information about Herrick’s show.
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The jury also declined to find that Mattel lied to Herrick, a producer for 2 Guns and Lone Survivor who was represented by Bryan Freedman and Miles Feldman, about its interest in Playmakers .
In the trial, Mattel leaned on arguments it chose not to move forward with Herrick’s pitch when Phil Gurin, an executive producer on Shark Tank , severed ties with the project. His participation was the “only reason Mattel took the meeting” over Playmakers “in the first place,” said Iser, who noted that the company didn’t know Herrick since he had “zero track record in television” at the time.
And in a move to undermine Herrick’s bid for roughly $46 million in profits tied to The Toy Box , Mattel stressed that the series was largely a failure and that Playmakers likely wouldn’t have fared any better.
“ The Toy Box was a flop,” Iser said. “It was canceled after two seasons.”
According to the company, Mattel lost nearly $8 million as a result of its participation in the show.
In a statement, Feldman said there are “substantial grounds for a new trial.” He added, “This verdict is only a temporary setback for Herrick Productions and creators everywhere” and that it was “far from unanimous.”
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