Wendt v. Host Int'l, Inc.

Actors Wendt and Ratzenberger (plaintiffs) played characters on Cheers; Host International (defendant), licensed by Paramount to use the Cheers set and characters, placed animatronic robot figures the actors claimed were modeled on their own physical likenesses in airport bars styled after the show's bar. The actors sued under California's statutory and common-law right of publicity and the Lanham Act; after the district court twice ruled for the defendants based on its own visual comparison of photographs and then the actual robots, the actors appealed again.

Whether a person may sue to prevent the unauthorized commercial appropriation of his own physical likeness through a figure resembling him, separate from any copyright interest in a fictional character he portrayed.