Pittsburgh, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2006 before going straight to cable and DVD this year, is a mock documentary about Jeff Goldblum’s run starring in a production of The Music Man in his hometown. Some of the film is “real”; some of it is sketched to look real, ala Christopher Guest; some of it uses “real” situations, Borat-style, as the backdrop for improvisation. A stagehand captured in some of the latter antics is now suing to have her scene removed from the film.
Debbie Sue Croyle says she was never asked to sign a release, and in fact only learned of the film after it premiered on cable and “other people saw it and told her about it.” She says she is “humiliated” by her appearance in the film, because Goldblum used a double entendre in the scene in which she appears. But oddly, the actor is not named in suit: Croyle is suing the production companies that made the film, the film’s directors, and the Starz cable channel, for $4 million. Seems like a huge sum, considering the film had no theatrical release and all but flew under the radar of most non-Starz subscribers and non-Goldblum superfans. Still, it’s an interseting case; I’m fairly surprised the release form issue hasn’t come up before with higher-profile doc/com hybrids. More details here.
Dear Ms. Croyle: Please do not agonize about your role in
“Pittsburg.” I have watched the film three times, especially
carefully. I have no recollection of the scene you were in.
Perhaps I was so focused on Mr. Goldblum that I missed you?
I do not recall a double entendre, and I am an ENGLISH MAJOR.
To assauge my curiousity, why did you request that a
bureaucratic, busy film production company make a small
donation to a chairty rather than simply taking the pay and
donating it yourself in your own name? Did you not see the
man with the camera when you were putting the microphone on Mr.
Goldblum? Why would you be “humiliated” by a slightly sexual
comment from JEFF GOLDBLUM? Why did you wait until two months
after the film’s big premiere on STARS to file suit? Are you
seriously warped person or merely a greedy one?