Contracts in this domain are notoriously one-sided in favor of the established producers and studios. I have some writings that occasionally draw the attention of movie/television producers, and on a few occasions these talks have gone far enough that I am presented with a contract. To paraphrase some of the common conditions (where "we/us/our" refers to the producers and "you" refers to the author):
> We do not guarantee you will earn any money on this deal.
> We may cancel or sell our rights to this contract at any time, you may not.
> We can use your name and likeness in any way we deem appropriate.
> You may not make any public statement about us without our prior consent.
> If you decide to sue us for any reason, we can veto your attorney selections.
> Even if we pull some serious shenanigans we are immune from consequence.
And so on. In each case I declined to sign; life's too short to agree to such hostile, one-sided terms. Perhaps one day I'll be approached by some aspirational, non-greedy producers. I'd be happy to sign a fair contract.
Yes indeed! Last time around (about 2 years ago) I uploaded the contract to Google Docs, added comments/suggestions for editing, and shared it with the producers in question. Their response was to schedule a call explaining why the contested terms are all "standard boilerplate" that they cannot change. They wouldn't budge a single word. So we went our separate ways.
Hypothetically, what I gained was a toehold into the film industry, with the possibility of future payment. But considering the perils of Hollywood accounting [1] I wasn't hopeful about ever seeing a penny. I wasn't desperate and their offer wasn't compelling, so I walked away.
It is a contract and is completely legal. A contract does not need to be "fair" to both sides, only "reasonable". There might be some argument that this contract is unconscionable, but that is a difficult battle, especially when one has so willingly given up their rights to their material. The court system was not designed to come running in to save individuals just because they have made a foolish deal.
If you are referring to the first amendment, that protects us from government censorship. There are a number of ways we may agree to censor ourselves when interacting with private entities. I signed a non disclosure agreement with my employer. I agree not to create photos of expos I enter. And so on. It seems excessive, but it's legal to stipulate it.
Just curious, if you discard the legitimacy of private profit, is it ever legitimate to silence employees? I'm skeptical but I'm open to a good argument.
Most of the time the agreements I hear about are basically to guarantee that private corruption will go unpunished.
> We do not guarantee you will earn any money on this deal.
> We may cancel or sell our rights to this contract at any time, you may not.
> We can use your name and likeness in any way we deem appropriate.
> You may not make any public statement about us without our prior consent.
> If you decide to sue us for any reason, we can veto your attorney selections.
> Even if we pull some serious shenanigans we are immune from consequence.
And so on. In each case I declined to sign; life's too short to agree to such hostile, one-sided terms. Perhaps one day I'll be approached by some aspirational, non-greedy producers. I'd be happy to sign a fair contract.