New Moon Script Finder Sues Summit

Roughly a year ago Casey Ray, a St. Louis area hairdresser, found Anna Kendrick’s watermarked New Moon script in a dumpster outside a hotel where Anna had been staying while she shot Up in the Air With George Clooney and crew.  Additionally she found another unwatermarked script entitled “Memoirs” at the same location. Memoirs was the original title for Remember Me.

“When Ray found the scripts, she considered leaking them to a national tabloid but decided against it, said her lawyer, Al Watkins.

“My client didn’t really want to get paid,” he said, but she was interested in hanging onto the scripts as collector’s items.

Watkins helped her return them to Los Angeles-based Summit Entertainment LLC, the studio making the movies. He said the studio invited Ray to premieres for the two films, and will certify the scripts as authentic after the movies are released.

“Summit doesn’t comment on any of the deals it does,” Summit spokesman Paul Pflug said. But he added, “We thank Ms. Ray for doing the right thing.”

MSNBC has a good outline of what happened here.
Then several months later, Casey Ray complained to TMZ that it was going to cost her over $1,200 in travel expenses to attend the New Moon premiere and after party. As part of her deal she was able to attend both events, walk down the read carpet, and get a script signed by the entire cast, but travel expenses were never included.

“Casey Ray tells TMZ she’s grateful Summit Entertainment coughed up two tickets to the film’s L.A. premiere and after party on November 16 — but the cost of traveling expenses is biting her in the behind.

Ray says the round-trip tickets for her and her niece cost $1,200 — plus another bundle to pay for a hotel and whatever other expenses the duo happens to rack up.

We spoke to a rep for Summit who says Ray’s complaint comes as a complete surprise. The rep said Ray had no problems with the reward package — which also includes a walk down the red carpet and a signed copy of the script by the movie’s lead actors — when she agreed on it back in May … and Summit hasn’t heard a peep from Ray since.”

Read the rest on TMZ
EDITED:(Just found more to the story, read below) Al Watkins, Casey Ray’s attorney, denies the TMZ story and sheds more light on his client’s frame of mind:

“”Casey and I told them that we would have loved it if Summit had paid for her flight and hotel, but that was never part of the deal,” Watkins tells Daily RFT. “They just took that one part of our conversation and ran with it.”

Watkins adds that part of the deal with Summit has Ray receiving a copy of the script signed by the actors in the film, which could net thousands of dollars at auction.

“It was a very fair deal,” he says.

But what was Ray — a hairdresser with Salon K in the Delmar Loop — doing in the hotel’s garbage to begin with?

“She was waiting for her boyfriend and just killing time,” explains Watkins. “She’s a Dumpster diver. Look, I’m not going to judge her hobby. She opened the bin and the script was lying there right on top. It’s not like she was inside the Dumpster rummaging through the garbage — though I’m not saying she wouldn’t do such a thing.”

Read the rest on the Riverfront Times. There is also a photogallery of Casey Ray having her photo taken with Melissa Rosenberg, Alex Meraz, and Charlie Bewley at what appears to be the red carpet and the after party.
Now apparently instead of attending the Remember Me premiere personally, Casey Ray tried to auction off her premiere tickets and after party attendance on EBAY.  According to correspondence made public via court papers Summit discovered the auction and advised Casey Ray that the items as per their agreement were non-transferable, however Ray’s attorney thinks they are. It then looked like they tried to reach a compromise settlement, which evidently failed, and now there’s a lawsuit.
St. Louis Today has the details. as does the St. Louis Business Journal.
Unless they settle this out of court it’s unlikely that this will be resolved before the Remember Me Premiere which takes place this Monday in New York.  It’s all going to come down to contract law and the written agreements. What do you think about the only certain thing here which is, in our opinion, what a mess!