Law Offices of Kathleen Conkey 

Kathleen Conkey is an experienced New York City entertainment, media and copyright lawyer with a focus on television and film content and production, as well as books, plays, musicals and screenplays.  In practice for 28 years, she provides legal advice and counsel on fair use, copyright, trademark, libel, right of publicity, misappropriation, privacy and news gathering torts.  She offers insight and help with E&O insurance, including fair use opinion letters and risk assessments.  She provides legal training for production crews and advice on all aspects of production.  She reviews, drafts and negotiates entertainment, media, agency and publishing contracts. 

Her clients are filmmakers, television production companies, producers and networks, print and internet publishers, online production and advertising companies, documentarians, filmmakers, video game makers, graphic artists, authors, memoirists, screenwriters, playwrights and other content creators, including two Academy Award-nominated documentarians, a Pulitizer Prize-winning author, several production companies with popular reality series on cable networks and filmmakers with theatrical releases.

The firm offers advice on fair use, copyright, defamation, privacy, right of publicity, misappropriation, trademark, newsgathering, First Amendment, releases, option agreements, life rights, payola/plugola, hidden camera, "Son of Sam" laws and confidential sources, with an emphasis on clearances and pre-publication review, to help protect your content and your business from legal claims. 

Kathleen Conkey was a litigation associate at Debevoise & Plimpton and Lankenau, Kovner & Kurtz and an in-house attorney at MTV Networks - Viacom, CBS Television and King World Productions, where she served as  production counsel for scores of television programs of every conceivable format--daily news, talk, game shows, reality, scripted comedy and drama, food, lifestyle, animated, courtroom and awards shows. 

Practice Areas

• Pre-Publication Review (vetting content to avoid legal claims) including rights and clearances

• Insurance Opinion Letters - Fair Use, Libel

• Legal Training for Producers 
  

• Entertainment, Media, Copyright

• Production Counsel