A Napkin Litigation Practice
Litigation for Entertainment Ventures
The Project Succeeded. Then Everyone Remembered the Deal Differently.
A producer promises a percentage. An investor funds the project. A creator builds the audience. One person controls the company and its accounts. Everyone agrees that the paperwork can come later.
Then the project earns money, attracts financing, signs a distribution deal, or receives an acquisition offer.
That is when an informal entertainment venture can become a serious business dispute.
Lieb at Law litigates disputes over ownership, control, compensation, accounting, governance, and the division of value created through entertainment, media, sports, and creator ventures.
Ownership is disputed.
From Shared Opportunity to Competing Stories
The Deal Worked Until There Was Something Worth Fighting Over.
The parties may agree about how the relationship began but disagree completely about what everyone was supposed to receive.
One person remembers an investment. Another remembers a loan. One remembers equity. Another remembers a fee. One remembers a permanent partnership. Another remembers a single project.
By the time attorneys become involved, the original deal may be scattered across messages, payments, draft agreements, production records, tax documents, credits, financial statements, and years of conduct.
Napkin Litigation provides a method for reconstructing that relationship and determining what can be established.
Business Disputes Arising From Entertainment Ventures
This Is Not About the Red Carpet. It Is About the Business Behind It.
The people behind an entertainment-related venture may disagree about the business they built, funded, operated, or expected to own. Lieb at Law serves as litigation counsel when those disagreements become ownership, compensation, accounting, governance, or business separation disputes.
Film, Television and Production Ventures
Disputes among investors, producers, production companies, founders, operators, and other participants over funding, company ownership, project expenses, management authority, compensation, credits, and back-end participation.
Music and Live Entertainment Businesses
Business disputes involving management companies, production ventures, touring businesses, promoters, investors, venues, merchandising ventures, compensation arrangements, commissions, expenses, and the allocation of revenue.
Creator and Digital Media Businesses
Disputes involving podcasts, video channels, content companies, influencer businesses, online communities, production studios, subscriber revenue, sponsorship income, platform control, business accounts, and ownership of the operating company.
Sports and NIL-Related Ventures
Business disputes involving investors, managers, agencies, operators, athletes, sponsors, merchandising companies, media ventures, and the division of income generated through a sports-related business.
Agencies, Management Companies and Talent Ventures
Disputes over commissions, management authority, company ownership, fiduciary duties, compensation, diverted opportunities, termination, and control of the business relationship.
Entertainment-Related Real Estate and Operating Businesses
Disputes involving studios, venues, production facilities, event spaces, and other businesses where the conflict includes ownership, leases, property interests, company control, or the value of an operating location.
The Questions Beneath the Labels
What Did Each Person Actually Own?
The parties may use entertainment-industry language, but the lawsuit often turns on familiar business questions.
The most important question is not always who created the project. It may be who owns the company, who funded it, who controls it, who was entitled to be paid, and where the money went.
- Was the money an investment, a loan, or an advance?
- Was the promised percentage equity, compensation, or profit participation?
- Who owns the company that entered the contracts and received the money?
- Who had authority to make decisions for the venture?
- Was someone promised an ownership interest that was never formally issued?
- Did the parties agree to share profits, losses, or both?
- Were company funds used for personal or unrelated expenses?
- Were revenue and opportunities moved into another company?
- Was an owner denied access to financial records or company accounts?
- Did a manager, member, officer, or partner breach a fiduciary duty?
- Can the participants continue operating together?
- If the relationship must end, how should the business be valued and divided?
Real Client Questions
“They Said I Owned Part of It. Now They Say I Was Just Helping.”
“I funded the project. Why am I being told I do not own anything?”
“We agreed to split the back end. Now they say the promise was not binding.”
“My partner controls the accounts and will not provide statements.”
“The project is earning money, but I am not receiving distributions.”
“They moved our contracts, revenue, or opportunities into another company.”
“I helped build the business. Now I have been locked out.”
“The expenses do not match the project’s apparent success.”
“A buyer appeared, and suddenly my ownership was disputed.”
“They are calling my equity a fee and my investment a loan.”
“We own the company equally, but one person makes every decision.”
These disputes are rarely resolved by finding one perfect agreement. The entire business relationship may need to be reconstructed.
The Record of What Actually Happened
When the Contract Is Incomplete, the Rest of the Evidence Matters.
Depending on the dispute, the relevant record may include:
- Text messages, emails, and messaging applications
- Draft agreements and proposed deal terms
- Investment wires and capital contributions
- Loan documents and repayment records
- Profit-participation and compensation statements
- Production budgets and expense records
- Company bank and credit card statements
- Entity filings and governance records
- Tax returns, K-1s, and ownership representations
- Distribution and sponsorship agreements
- Pitch decks and investor materials
- Credits and public descriptions of the participants
- Prior payments and distributions
- Passwords, platform access, and control of company accounts
- Communications with accountants, investors, vendors, and business partners
- Related companies receiving revenue or opportunities
- The parties’ course of conduct over time
No single document necessarily proves the entire relationship. The evidence must be evaluated together with the governing law, entity structure, parties’ conduct, and claims and defenses available to each side.
Where the Dispute Will Be Decided
Arbitration, State Court, or Federal Court
The proper forum can affect discovery, timing, confidentiality, available relief, and cost. It may also determine whether the parties can obtain financial records, seek interim relief, or have the dispute decided privately.
Lieb at Law represents clients in commercial arbitration and in state and federal courts, subject to the governing agreements, jurisdiction, attorney admissions, and requirements of the particular matter.
Commercial Arbitration
An operating agreement, investment agreement, production agreement, management agreement, or other contract may require the parties to arbitrate.
In arbitration, we evaluate:
- The scope and enforceability of the arbitration provision
- Which parties and claims are covered
- Selection of the arbitrator and administering forum
- Available document and financial discovery
- Emergency procedures where available
- Evidentiary hearings
- Available remedies
- Confirmation or challenge of an award where legally supported
Arbitration is not automatically confidential. Privacy depends on the parties’ agreement, forum rules, applicable law, and orders entered in the proceeding.
State Court Litigation
State court may be the proper forum for disputes involving:
- Breach of contract
- Disputed ownership agreements
- Corporate and limited liability company governance
- Fiduciary duties and self-dealing
- Books and records
- Financial accountings
- Shareholder, member, and partner rights
- Deadlock and business divorce
- Dissolution and buyout proceedings
- Fraud and misrepresentation
- Diversion of company revenue or opportunities
- Temporary or preliminary relief where supported
Federal Court Litigation
A business dispute may proceed in federal court when an independent basis for federal jurisdiction exists, including certain disputes between citizens of different states that satisfy the statutory requirements.
The fact that a venture operates across state lines does not automatically create federal jurisdiction.
Forum analysis must begin with the parties, governing agreements, entity documents, claims, requested relief, and applicable jurisdictional rules.
What We Litigate
Business Disputes Connected to Entertainment Ventures
Depending on the facts and governing law, these matters may include:
- Founder and co-owner disputes
- Investor and operator disputes
- Disputed equity promises
- Profit-participation and back-end compensation disputes
- Royalty and revenue accounting disputes
- Producer and participant compensation disputes
- Management and commission disputes
- Breach of contract
- Fraud and misrepresentation
- Fiduciary duty and self-dealing
- Diversion of company revenue or business opportunities
- Unauthorized transfer or use of company assets
- Books-and-records proceedings
- Financial accountings
- Minority owner freeze-outs
- Ownership deadlock
- Business divorce
- Valuation and buyout disputes
- Dissolution proceedings
- Post-separation competition and solicitation disputes
- Arbitration and negotiated business separations
The Napkin Litigation Framework
Start With the Business, Not the Complaint.
Protect and Audit
Identify what is at risk and preserve the communications, financial records, company documents, accounts, and electronic information needed to understand the dispute.
Reconstruct the Deal
Determine what each person promised, contributed, received, controlled, reported, and represented to the other participants and third parties.
Identify Ownership and Injury
Separate the company from the project. Separate ownership from compensation. Separate the participant’s individual rights from rights belonging to the business.
Then determine who may have suffered the legally recognized injury and who may hold the corresponding claim.
Select the Claims and Forum
Evaluate the governing agreements, entity documents, arbitration provisions, jurisdiction, available claims, potential defenses, and forms of relief that may be supported.
Protect the Business During the Dispute
Consider whether interim measures are needed to preserve financial records, accounts, revenue, management stability, or the value of the operating business.
Build the Off-Ramp
Not every successful result is a trial verdict. Depending on the matter, the appropriate outcome may involve an accounting, payment, buyout, restructuring, governance agreement, settlement, arbitration award, dissolution, or orderly separation.
The Business May Need to Survive the Lawsuit
Do Not Destroy the Asset Everyone Is Fighting Over.
A public dispute can affect more than the immediate parties. It may disrupt employees, investors, financing, vendors, talent relationships, sponsors, distribution, future projects, and a pending transaction.
No attorney can promise that litigation will remain private or that the business will retain its value. The goal is to make decisions with both the legal claims and the underlying business in view.
- Whether revenue continues during the dispute
- Who controls company accounts and financial information
- Whether the business can continue operating under current management
- Whether expenditures and distributions require oversight
- Whether a pending transaction or financing event is at risk
- Whether the parties need a temporary governance arrangement
- Whether the business or an ownership interest must be valued
- Whether arbitration, mediation, or another negotiated process is appropriate
- Whether a buyout or separation can preserve more value than continued conflict
For Attorneys
When the Entertainment Deal Becomes a Business Lawsuit
Entertainment and transactional attorneys are often the first to recognize that a client’s problem is no longer about negotiating the next agreement.
The warning signs may include:
- Competing ownership claims
- Frozen payments or distributions
- Missing financial statements
- Refused access to books and records
- Diversion of revenue or opportunities
- An owner or investor being excluded
- A management deadlock
- Conflicting tax or entity records
- Threatened removal from the company
- A proposed sale exposing unresolved ownership
- Evidence at risk of being lost or altered
Lieb at Law works with referring attorneys when a client needs litigation counsel for an ownership, governance, accounting, compensation, control, or business separation dispute.
The firms can define their respective roles after conflicts review and consultation with the client. Any co-counsel arrangement, division of responsibility, or fee arrangement must comply with applicable ethical rules and client-consent requirements.
Firm Leadership
Napkin Litigation Led by Andrew Lieb
Andrew Lieb is the Founder and Managing Partner of Lieb at Law, P.C. and the creator of the Napkin Litigation Framework.
His litigation practice includes commercial disputes, ownership conflicts, corporate governance matters, employment litigation, discrimination claims, real estate disputes, and real estate brokerage litigation.
Andrew is also the founder of Lieb School and teaches attorneys and other professionals about litigation strategy, business ownership disputes, incomplete agreements, investor conflicts, corporate governance, and the legal consequences of allowing a business to outgrow its documentation.
Frequently Asked Questions
Business Litigation for Entertainment Ventures
These answers provide general information and do not constitute legal advice for a particular matter.
What is an entertainment Napkin Litigation dispute?
It is a business dispute arising from an entertainment, media, sports, production, management, or creator venture in which the parties’ agreement is incomplete, informal, outdated, disputed, or inconsistent with how the business actually operated.
The dispute may concern company ownership, investment, compensation, control, financial reporting, fiduciary duties, distributions, or the division of value when the relationship ends.
Can text messages or emails prove an ownership agreement?
Texts and emails may be relevant evidence, but their legal effect depends on their content, context, applicable law, the parties’ conduct, and whether the alleged agreement satisfied any governing legal requirements.
A message using the word “partner” or promising a “percentage” does not necessarily answer whether the parties created equity ownership, compensation rights, a joint venture, or another relationship.
What if the parties never signed an operating agreement?
The absence of an executed operating agreement does not automatically resolve the dispute. The analysis may include formation records, statutory default rules, tax filings, capital contributions, communications, draft agreements, distributions, management conduct, and representations made to third parties.
Is funding a project enough to establish ownership?
Not necessarily. Money may represent equity, debt, an advance, a recoverable production expense, or another financial arrangement. The characterization depends on the parties’ agreement, records, conduct, entity structure, and governing law.
Can an investor or owner demand financial records?
Potential rights to books, records, financial statements, tax documents, or an accounting depend on the person’s legal status, the entity involved, governing documents, applicable statutes, and the nature of the claims.
A person claiming to be an owner may first need to establish the basis for that status.
Can these disputes be handled in arbitration?
Yes, when the parties have an enforceable agreement requiring arbitration or voluntarily agree to arbitrate after the dispute begins. Otherwise, the matter may proceed in state or federal court if jurisdiction and venue requirements are satisfied.
Is arbitration confidential?
Not automatically. Confidentiality depends on the arbitration agreement, applicable rules, governing law, and orders entered by the arbitrator or a court.
Can the court protect company accounts or revenue during the lawsuit?
A party may request temporary relief when the facts, law, evidence, and procedural requirements support it. Available relief depends on the claims, forum, urgency, risk of harm, and ability to satisfy the applicable legal standard.
Can Lieb at Law work with an existing attorney?
Yes. Lieb at Law may serve as litigation counsel while an existing attorney continues to advise the client within that attorney’s role. The attorneys should define their responsibilities, protect client confidentiality, address conflicts, and obtain any required client consent.
How can an attorney refer a matter to Lieb at Law?
An attorney can contact the firm for an initial attorney-to-attorney discussion. The referring attorney should provide only enough nonconfidential information to permit a preliminary conflicts and fit analysis. No client information should be disclosed without appropriate authorization.
Talk With Litigation Counsel
The Project May Be Entertainment. The Fight Is About the Business.
When ownership, compensation, control, accounting, governance, or company value is disputed, the first step is determining what was promised, what can be proven, who owns what, and what must be protected.
Lieb at Law evaluates business disputes arising from entertainment-related ventures in arbitration and in state and federal courts where the firm is authorized to appear.
Submitting an inquiry does not create an attorney-client relationship. Do not send confidential or time-sensitive information until the firm confirms that it can consider the matter and agrees to the engagement. This page is attorney advertising and provides general information, not legal advice. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.