Long-standing U.K. production house Gorgeous–which had been repped stateside via Anonymous Content for some 10 years–has now gone off on its own in the U.S. marketplace, opening a West Hollywood office under the aegis of executive producer Anna Hashmi. Via its new Southern California shop, Gorgeous will produce work for the American ad market, representing its ensemble of U.K. talent–including directors Frank Budgen, Chris Palmer, Peter Thwaites, Tom Carty and Vince Squib–to U.S. agencies and brands. Furthermore, Gorgeous has added a notable stateside director to the mix, Ellen Kuras who comes over from Park Pictures.
Kuras first established herself in the industry as a cinematographer before successfully diversifying into directing. Her TV spot helming credits span such brands as Nike, AT&T, Powerade and Delta. She made a major directorial splash in 2009 when her feature documentary Nerakhoon (The Betrayal) earned an Academy Award nomination.
A three-time recipient of the Sundance Best Cinematography Award, Kuras has lensed assorted spots for various directors, as well as feature-length fare for such filmmakers as Martin Scorsese (Public Speaking), Sam Mendes (Away We Go), Spike Lee (Summer of Sam), and Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Be Kind Rewind).
As for the caliber of Gorgeous’ U.K. roster, Thwaites won the DGA Award as Best Commercial Director of 2008. Palmer was nominated for the DGA Award based on his spot work in 2009 and Budgen is a two-time nominee for the DGA honor on the strength of his ad entries for 2007 and 2010. Gorgeous recently earned distinction as the D&AD’s most awarded production company of the last 50 years.
Gorgeous’ U.S. exec producer Hashmi had most recently served as Thwaites’ full-time producer.
Gorgeous has set up a network of independent rep firms to serve as its sales force in the U.S.: Resource handles Gorgeous on the West Coast, MKH in the Midwest, and Representation Co on the East Coast.
AI-Assisted Works Can Get Copyright With Enough Human Creativity, According To U.S. Copyright Office
Artists can copyright works they made with the help of artificial intelligence, according to a new report by the U.S. Copyright Office that could further clear the way for the use of AI tools in Hollywood, the music industry and other creative fields.
The nation's copyright office, which sits in the Library of Congress and is not part of the executive branch, receives about half a million copyright applications per year covering millions of individual works. It has increasingly been asked to register works that are AI-generated.
And while many of those decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, the report issued Wednesday clarifies the office's approach as one based on what the top U.S. copyright official describes as the "centrality of human creativity" in authoring a work that warrants copyright protections.
"Where that creativity is expressed through the use of AI systems, it continues to enjoy protection," said a statement from Register of Copyrights Shira Perlmutter, who directs the office.
An AI-assisted work could be copyrightable if an artist's handiwork is perceptible. A human adapting an AI-generated output with "creative arrangements or modifications" could also make it fall under copyright protections.
The report follows a review that began in 2023 and fielded opinions from thousands of people that ranged from AI developers, to actors and country singers.
It shows the copyright office will continue to reject copyright claims for fully machine-generated content. A person simply prompting a chatbot or AI image generator to produce a work doesn't give that person the ability to copyright that work, according to the report. "Extending protection to material whose expressive elements are determined by a machine ...... Read More