Tolkien Enterprises

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Tolkien Enterprises (TE), a trading name for the Saul Zaentz Company, owns the worldwide exclusive rights to certain elements of J. R. R. Tolkien's two most famous literary works; The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. These elements include the titles of the works, the names of characters contained within as well as the names of places, objects and events within them, and certain short phrases and sayings from the works.

TE licenses these rights out to other companies for use as trademarks and service marks. It also owns the rights to certain copyrightable elements of these two works, such as film and stage productions. Tolkien sold these rights to United Artists in 1968, who in turn sold them to Zaentz in 1976.

In 1978, Tolkien Enterprises produced the animated version of The Lord of the Rings directed by the controversial animator Ralph Bakshi, which covered approximately the first half of the Lord of the Rings. In 2001–2003 Peter Jackson filmed the whole Lord of the Rings under license from TE, which went on to win 17 Oscars and numerous other international and national awards.

In 1999, TE severed their licensing agreement with ICE for role-playing games set in Middle-earth after ICE ceased developing new products for this line. This contributed to ICE's filing for bankruptcy in 2001. Tolkien Enterprises then made a new licensing agreement with Decipher Inc. for their Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Game.

In 2002 TE took part in making the video game The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, which was based on the book, not on the film. Then, in 2003, TE took part in the making of The Hobbit video game, which was for a younger age group.

Following this, in August 2004, Tolkien Enterprises sued New Line Cinema for over $20 million in unpaid royalties, based on the difference between gross and net profits for The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, and the exact terms of the royalty arrangement between TE and NLC. An out-of-court settlement was reached in August 2005, however details were not released.

As of September 2006, the company's current licensees are as follows.

New Line Cinema for the three films released between 2001 and 2003 and related film merchandise
Turbine, Inc. for an online role-playing game, The Lord of the Rings Online
Decipher Inc. for the trading card (TCG) and roleplaying games
Games Workshop PLC for a range of miniatures, games (The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game and Battle of Five Armies) and Battle Games in Middle-earth magazine
Kevin Wallace Ltd for a stage production of The Lord of the Rings
Danbury Mint for a variety of related merchandise such as film cells, watches and goblets
Game Systems International Ltd for Middle-earth Play-By-Mail released by Game Systems Inc. and the One Ring module of Legends _(PBM) released by Harlequin Games.
U.S. Games Systems Inc.
Sophisticated Games for a range of board games
Lladró Comercial, S.A.
Royal Selangor International for a range of pewter goblets, tankards and chess pieces
Prince August for a range of 32mm scale miniatures released by its subsidiary, Mithril Miniatures