Zooey Deschanel, you know, the New Girl. Zooey’s show has just begun its first season on Fox network and by the looks of things this new girl will be a good pal, and probably stay on FOX network for a couple of seasons. Zooey Deschanel’s role in the New Girl is as Jess, an off-beat, slightly eccentric American girl who needs some new friends and an apartment. So why would a girl need these two essential things – a life and somewhere to live. Well, Jess was surprising her boyfriend and the surprise turned around on her when Jess found her boyfriend with another woman! Outside of Zooey’s role as Jess, the new girl, Zooey is also dealing with some partnership issues. Zooey signed on to a collaboration with Steve Madden, popular shoe designer to fashionistas worldwide. As the terms of the collaboration, Steve Madden would market shoes and accessories using Zooey Deschanel’s name, i.e. the Zooey shoe or the Zooey clutch. Evidentially, Madden’s agreement was originally for a sum of $2 million plus any royalties and such. The contract was renegotiated due to lack of interest from other retailers and knocked down to $1.5 million, still not a bad deal. However, Steve Madden has supposedly not paid Deschanel anything and furthermore the shoe designer has been selling the Zooey shoes and accessories in his stores as well as at Kohl’s department stores (this is how Zooey would have received royalties from the deal). The topper to the story is that Zooey turned down numerous other offers solely because of the agreement she and Madden had. The report form Women’s Wear Daily reads as follows; “The lawsuit alleged that Madden balked at the agreement to move forward with the brand in October and refused to compensate Deschanel. About three months before, the court documents allege that Madden approved a $2 million up-front payment to Deschanel in order to use her name and likeness, plus a 5 percent domestic royalty fee and a 4.5 percent international royalty fee, before reducing the up-front amount to $1.5 million with her consent.
So far there’s no comment from Madden’s camp. The shoe company has worked with some other celebs including the Olsen twins with their Elizabeth and James line, also the reasonably-priced Olsenboye line.”
As with any lawsuit, this sounds like a mess, but we hope Zooey luck and that she gets what is owed to her.
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