Black Ice premieres this week at the Toronto Film Festival.
The documentary about the Colored Hockey League, a segregated hockey league for Black players in Canada between 1895 and the 1930s, is produced by Drake, LeBron James, and Maverick Carter.
Former long-time head of the NBA players association Billy Hunter is suing Drake, James, and Darril Fosty and George Fosty --who wrote the book on which the documentary is based -- for $10 million for stealing the rights to the documentary.
The short of it is that Hunter says he paid the Fostys $265,000 in total for the movie rights to the story. However, he claims, they reneged on that deal and sold additional rights to James, Drake, and company. When Hunter confronted the Fostys on the duel deals, they told him the “competing venture” did not violate his “exclusive worldwide license” or film rights because the “documentary” was different than the fictionalized movie he had planned to make and did not violate the agreement.
As for James and Drake, Hunter accuses them of “tortious interference.”
“I don’t think they believed the property rights would be litigated. They thought I would go away. They gambled," Hunter said of the suit.
Drake and Lebron haven't commented on the case.