Bridgestone has responded to Sony’s lawsuit over actor Jerry Lambert’s appearance in a recent string of commercials. Earlier this week, news emerged that Sony is suing Bridgestone along with Lambert’s company Wildcat Creek, alleging that Lambert played his Kevin Butler character in Bridgestone’s recent campaign. At the time, Sony said “We invested significant resources in bringing the Kevin Butler character to life and he’s become an iconic personality directly associated with PlayStation products over the years. Use of the Kevin Butler character to sell products other than those from PlayStation misappropriates Sony’s intellectual property, creates confusion in the market, and causes damage to Sony.”
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Bridgestone has now responded to those claims, saying "Mr. Lambert is one of the actors who appeared in the commercial as a Bridgestone engineer. Bridgestone denies that 'Kevin Butler' appears in the Bridgestone commercial discussed herein and thus denies that he speaks or does anything whatsoever in the commercial." Bridgestone will reportedly fight the suit on the grounds that Sony does not actually own a trademark for the Kevin Butler character, and that “the character has not acquired secondary meaning and that there is no likelihood of confusion among consumers.”
Lambert first appeared in the ads earlier this year, promoting Bridgestone’s Game On promotion, which featured him playing Mario Kart Wii along with other engineers. Kevin Butler, meanwhile, has been a Sony marketing staple since 2009 and will next appear as downloadable content in LittleBigPlanet Karting.
We previously reached out to Sony about the case, but a spokesperson declined to comment. Sony and Bridgestone are already in discussions over a settlement, and a deadline of Friday, October 12th has been set for the case to be settled or proceed to trial. Keep checking back to IGN for additional updates on the case as they’re revealed.
Andrew Goldfarb is IGN’s associate news editor. Keep up with pictures of the latest food he’s been eating by following @garfep on Twitter or garfep on IGN.
Source : ign[dot]com
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