By Gary Symons
TLL Editor in Chief
A Florida man who tattooed his face to resemble the DC character The Joker says the Grand Theft Auto game used his likeness in a promotional trailer.
Lawrence Sullivan is demanding millions in damages, claiming video game studio Rockstar Games used his likeness in a recent trailer for the latest instalment of the massively popular game GTA 6.
There is some evidence to suggest that’s the case, opening the door for a possible legal action to see if companies have to pay a private citizen to use their likeness, even if that likeness is used in a parody in a video game, film or TV series.
So, how did Rockstar end up in a showdown with the real-life Joker? The answer is strange enough to be included in the game itself, so who knows; maybe we’ll actually see it in an upcoming DLC update!
Sullivan briefly went viral for all the wrong reasons in 2017 when he was arrested in Miami for allegedly pointing a gun at passing cars. Video and photos coming out of the case showed Sullivan with tattoos and green-dyed hair that earned him the nickname ‘The Florida Joker’, and Sullivan himself later confirmed he changed his appearance to closely resemble Batman’s long-time nemesis.
A year after his arrest on gun charges, Sullivan told the Florida news station WFLA that tragic events in his life, including a bad breakup and the murder of a friend in 2014 led him to feel a kinship with the Joker character, as portrayed by Heath Ledger in the film The Dark Knight.
“Reborn, re-death type of stuff,” said Sullivan, who at the time was in custody for missing some court-ordered psychiatric appointments. “The old Lawrence you saw with the plain face, he’s dead. This is the new Lawrence-slash-Joker.” Sullivan hit headlines again this week after posting a TikTok video in which he claims a character shown in the GTA 6 video clearly portrays him.
Rockstar released the video on Dec. 4, and thanks to the pent up demand of fans who have been waiting years for the next instalment of Grand Theft Auto, the promo racked up 93 million views in a single day on YouTube, breaking the record for a non-music video.
Critically, the trailer refers to a number of viral news stories in Florida, where the new game is set, and includes one scene with a man sporting facial tattoos similar to Sullivan’s, and with his hair dyed purple rather than green. It’s worth noting that DC’s character The Joker’s color palette is purple and green. Sullivan then shows an image of himself versus the image of the GTA character (seen in the photo at top), adding, “That’s me—that’s the person they got their inspiration from—me!” he argues.
Sullivan said it’s clear that character is based on his likeness, saying anyone would have to be “out of your goddamn nuggets” to fail seeing the similarity. He also demanded a financial settlement for what one assumes would be a Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) copyright infraction. “GTA, we got to talk,” said Sullivan. “If not, you got to give me like, a mil or two.”
Whether Sullivan gets his mil or two is very much up for debate, but Rockstar famously won another case in which the actor Lindsay Lohan sued the company in 2014, saying a character in Grand Theft Auto 5 was based directly on her appearance. The New York State Supreme Court dismissed that case, saying the image could not be determined to be Lohan, and that Rockstar never used her name, photo or featured any reference to her or her acting career.
More to the point, the court said Lohan still would not have been owed compensation even if she could have proved her likeness was used in the game, thanks to longstanding legal precedents that allow the makers of films, TV series and video games to feature real-life characters, as opposed to advertisements that would require payment. For example, the fictional series The Crown has famously outraged the Royal Family in the UK by depicting them in a deeply personal portrayal of their lives.
For that reason, most legal experts believe Sullivan would face a steep, uphill battle establishing a violation of his NIL rights.
While the trailer has been released, Rockstar says the game will not be released until 2025.
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