A US appeals court has upheld the January 2025 jury verdict that cleared Apple and M. Night Shyamalan of copyright infringement over the Apple TV series Servant, Reuters reported on 22 October.
The Ninth Circuit rejected the appeal by filmmaker Francesca Gregorini, who sued Apple and Shyamalan in January 2020, alleging that Servant plagiarised her 2013 film The Truth About Emanuel and seeking up to $81 million in damages. The lawsuit was initially dismissed before being reinstated and going to trial, where the jury viewed both the film and the first three episodes of Servant before ruling that the creators had not had access to Gregorini’s film (via 9to5Mac).
On appeal, Gregorini argued that the jury instructions on “widespread dissemination” were insufficient, and that the trial judge should have answered a juror’s question about the term before accepting the verdict. The appeals court rejected both arguments, finding that the instructions accurately reflected the law and that the judge did not abuse her discretion (via AppleInsider).
Servant, a psychological thriller starring Lauren Ambrose, Toby Kebbell, Nell Tiger Free and Rupert Grint, ran for four seasons on Apple TV+ and concluded in 2023. Shyamalan called the lawsuit “clearly, 100% a misunderstanding.”