Taylor Swift’s lawyers say a Utah theme park is wrong.
Evermore Park, in Pleasant Grove, took the singer to court alleging trademark infringement because of her new album, “Evermore”, earlier this month. Now, Swift’s legal team, who called the case “baseless”, is now raising its own allegations that the park has wrongly borrowed from Swift.
Utah’s extravagant lure made employees regularly sing their songs – including “Love Story”, “You Belong With Me” and “Bad Blood” – although the park did not get permission to do so, TAS Rights Management lawyers argued in the contrary action filed on Monday in Nashville federal court.
“These illegal music performances are marketed as a central attraction at Evermore Park,” says the suit.
He accuses Evermore Park CEO Ken Bretschneider of recently seeking a retroactive license agreement “in (a) veiled attempt to cover up and cover up” the infringement that had occurred since 2018, when the park opened.
BMI, the copyright organization, notified the park over several years that the presentations were copyright infringement, but the park ignored the warnings, the suit says.
Bretschneider and his lawyer, Jared Cherry, did not immediately return the phone messages left on Thursday.
His previous lawsuit against Swift alleges that the singer borrowed from the park’s marketing efforts, creating “real confusion” among his customers. And it claims that Swift’s lawyers ignored previous legal claims on the belief that the park, financially hit by the pandemic, could not afford to file a lawsuit.
Swift’s legal team called the allegations “unfounded” and said Utah businesses did indeed benefit from the association, rooting for the album on Twitter at the time of its release.
Swift’s publicist Tree Paine pointed out that several contractors who played a role in building the park sued Bretschneider and Evermore for non-payment.
“The real intent of this process should be obvious,” said Paine in a statement to Deseret News earlier this month.
Evermore Park opened in 2018 with an enthusiastic welcome and generated buzz as a unique escape. Their paths lead visitors through gardens, a crypt and a cemetery, where they meet actors who play the role of mythical creatures, fortune tellers and pirates.