Mark S. Lee

Working at the intersection of intellectual property and entertainment, Mark Lee advises celebrities and celebrity estates, studios, and high-tech companies in copyright, trademark, and right of publicity matters.  He has litigated or counseled regarding copyrights, trademarks, rights of publicity, and/or related rights of musicians Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Barbara Streisand, Brian Wilson, Neil Young, Steve Perry, Miles Davis, Jackson Browne, and John Lee Hooker; authors John Steinbeck, Harper Lee, Raymond Chandler, William Saroyan, Louis L’Amour, Helen Fielding, and Philip K. Dick; actors Robin Williams, Sylvester Stallone, Groucho Marx, and Doris Day; athletes Jim Brown, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Tiger Woods: fictional characters Betty Boop, Barney, Rocky, Zorro, Dennis the Menace, and Emily the Strange; and photographers Richard Avedon and Jim Marshall. 

Mark’s litigation record spans federal district and appeals courts across the country, as well as the U.S. Supreme Court and the Supreme Court of California. He has successfully tried five copyright, trademark or unfair competition actions to juries and argued more than 18 appeals. His clients have been granted seizure orders, preliminary injunctions and/or asset freezes against computer software or luxury goods pirates, Internet service providers, computer bulletin board operators, cellular phone or trunking radio cloners, and others.

Clients sometimes seek Mark’s assistance abroad. He has participated in civil and criminal proceedings in Canada, the United Kingdom, Finland, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria and the United States to remove pirated materials from the Internet, and to stop an internal computer software fraud ring. In Sweden and the People’s Republic of China, he successfully arbitrated international IP disputes.

At the vanguard of developments in IP law, Mark co-authored the 1999 amendments to—and negotiated language changes in the 2007 amendments to—California’s posthumous right of publicity statute. He also participated in drafting California’s anti-cybersquatting statute and the right of publicity statutes of Ohio and Pennsylvania.

In addition to his work on state statutes, Mark has authored or co-authored two books and numerous articles on entertainment and IP law.