Maxim Dmitriev’s (RAO Director General) interview to “Culture” newspaper
03.10.2017
Theatrical security agent
Russian Authors’ Society (RAO) chose licensing agent for the dramatic works staging. It’s LLC “Theatrical Agent”. RAO Director General Maxim DMITRIEV told the “Culture” correspondent about the future outcomes of this step for Russian authors and achievements in this sphere.
The “Culture”: Why did RAO decide to involve LLC “Theatrical Agent”?
Mr. Dmitriev: Nowadays to increase the efficiency of the collections, RAO is outsourcing certain activities. In particular, this relates to “grand rights”. It’s a vast area with a significant number of interested parties: writers, composers, directors, choreographers, stage designers, light and costume designers. And it’s crucial to establish a transparent system to meet authors’ expectations and ensure their interests’ protection.
We’ve been cooperating with “Theatrical Agent” not so long, but, in my opinion, we’ve already achieved positive results.
The situation with non-payments to RAO on already signed licensing agreements is quite illustrative. Unfortunately, certain users neglect other people’s intellectual property rights. “Theatrical Agent” employees have revealed the facts of non-payment by some users. For unknown reason, some theaters haven’t been paying royalties for many years. “Theatrical Agent” deals with precedents like this, and in a number of cases it’s already managed to achieve debt repayments. The agents are result-oriented as they’re dependent on fee interest, which means they will act more efficiently.
Besides, “Theatrical Agent” provides legal advisory services to authors, starting with consultations on signing contracts with theaters and ending with a full range of support in the legal field. “Theatrical Agent” works hard on providing comfortable services to its clients, and today authors’ remuneration is paid literally within a week from the moment of money transfer to the Agent’s bank account. Before that, money was “stuck” in RAO for at least a month.
In the future, we’d like “Theatrical Agent” to help authors promote the results of their creative work. I think such a step could mean significant support for the authors who want to bring their creativity to potential consumers.