Registering a screenplay with a government copyright agency is recommended for protection in legal disputes. Third-party companies, such as the Writer’s Guild of America, offer similar services. Copyrights may have restrictions and require periodic reapplication.
For a writer, a screenplay or screenplay can be as valuable as a luxury car. Just as a person purchases alarm systems to protect valuables from theft, writers too seek to protect their written property with a copyright. Finding out how to copyright a script is an important part of ensuring the protection of a work you create.
Many regions have government offices that handle registration and copyrights for written material. Obtaining a copyright from a government organization can be as simple as filling out a form, paying a fee, and sending a copy to the organization for records. Deciding to copyright a screenplay with a government agency is generally one of the most often recommended forms of protection, as federal agencies are generally considered reliable sources in court.
A government copyright office provides a record that the script was submitted by a particular author on a certain date. In many regions, the ability to copyright a script is an inherent individual right granted to the author, so the author has the copyright to all original material with or without official registration. Rather than allowing an author to copyright the script, what a registrar does is provide corroborating evidence of the script’s date, time, and version in the event of a legal copyright dispute.
In the United States, scripts can be registered online or by mail for copyright reasons with the Library of Congress. In the UK the same service is provided by the Intellectual Property Office. Canada uses a similar organization called the Canadian Intellectual Property Office. To copyright a script in any country, simply search for the government copyright agency.
Since a copyright is generally inherent in the common law and the registration serves only as a legal act, some third-party companies and organizations may be able to provide similar services to government offices. Writers’ organizations, such as the Writer’s Guild of America, allow script registration through their regional offices. The process for obtaining registration is generally the same as offered by other groups, although some experts recommend obtaining both a government and a third-party registration for the sake of legal redundancy. To copyright a script with a third-party company, call the regional guild offices or simply search for “script copyright” on the Internet.
It is important to remember when trying to copyright a script that registration, and even copyrights, can be restricted. In some cases, copyrights are valid only for a certain number of years after the death of the original author, after which the work returns to the public domain. Registration services may require periodic reapplication to keep records up to date, usually every five to ten years.
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