A legal battle has erupted over the rights to the iconic Ghostface mask, with Spyglass and Paramount Pictures filing a lawsuit against a Los Angeles-based special effects studio, Alterian Ghost Factory, claiming ownership of the droopy-eyed horror icon. The suit, filed in California federal court on Friday, seeks a court order barring the special effects studio from pursuing any copyright infringement litigation ahead of the release of Scream 7 later this month.
The complaint alleges that Alterian "intentionally slept on its purported rights" to the Ghostface mask, which has been a staple of the Scream franchise for three decades. According to the suit, the appearance of Ghostface can be traced back to one of the film's producers discovering the mask inside a Northern California home being scouted as a filming location. The production team subsequently licensed it from Fun World, a costume company that had been manufacturing and selling it since the early 1990s.
Alterian argues that Fun World had no right to license the mask, stating that it created the underlying design first. However, Paramount and Spyglass believe that the underlying dispute is between Fun World and Alterian, and that Alterian surrendered any potential right to claim ownership of Ghostface since it hasn't taken action despite knowing of Fun World's licensing deals for decades.
In July 2024, Alterian asserted rights to the mask, sending demand letters claiming that Fun World had infringed on its copyright to its designs. Fun World responded that it engaged a Hong Kong-based sculptor decades ago under a work-made-for-hire agreement to create a new line of Halloween masks.
The suit alleges that Alterian escalated its demands last month and threatened to file a lawsuit unless it was paid millions of dollars. In a 2020 case involving rights to the mask, a federal court found that Gardner is time-barred from asserting a claim since he knew of Fun World's licensing as early as 1996 and no later than 2003.
The complaint states that Alterian has never legally established that it owns the rights to the Ghostface mask and will not be able to prove it now in this litigation. The suit also claims that seeking to disrupt the release of a completed motion picture mere weeks before its release—the seventh installment of a franchise that Alterian watched grow in silence for three decades—is an "outrageous attempt to shake down" Spyglass and Paramount.
Alterian's work can be seen in The Return of the Living Dead, Zombieland, and Hocus Pocus. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
