Espresso creator wins copyright case against ONE Productions over use of programme assets

The creator and original director of the television programme Espresso has won a copyright case against ONE Productions after a court found that the station had continued using his work without permission for years after he left the programme.

On Monday, Judge Ian Spiteri Bailey ruled that the broadcaster had infringed the intellectual property rights of producer and creative director Antoine Muscat.

The court found that ONE Productions had continued to use Espresso's distinctive set design, furniture, props and signature jingle — works created by Muscat between 2015 and 2016 — without his authorisation.

It also held that the broadcaster had violated Muscat's moral rights by failing to acknowledge him as the programme's author.
Earlier unfair competition claim fell through

This was not Muscat's first attempt to take ONE Productions to court over the fate of Espresso. Muscat had first taken legal action in 2018, arguing that ONE Productions' continued use of the Espresso name amounted to unfair competition.

However, the court had ruled the name itself was "a word of common and generic use".

However, the court had observed that Muscat's real grievance appeared to concern the "theft of a programme and copyright" rather than the title itself.

Muscat subsequently filed fresh proceedings under the Copyright Act.

"My work was stolen"

Espresso first hit the airwaves in 2015 and went on to become one of Maltese television's longest-running daily programmes.
Muscat testified that he had come up with the programme's magazine-style format, designed its "modern and abstract" set, personally put together many of the props to keep costs down and composed its distinctive theme tune.

He also brought presenters Wayne Aquilina and Paulette Gafa on board.

Muscat told the court that he had suddenly found himself out of a job after his programme was "stolen" by ONE Productions.

Relations between the parties soured after the first season was aired, while talks were under way over the popular programme's future.
Muscat recounted how presenter Wayne Aquilina informed him by email that he would no longer be working with him, and how he later discovered that Aquilina had removed him as an administrator of the programme's Facebook page.

His last episode aired on September 23, 2016. Three days later, Espresso returned to the screen without his involvement.

According to Muscat, ONE Productions had simply carried on with the programme he had created while leaving him out of the credits.

Court had "no doubt"

During the proceedings, ONE Productions chairperson Ruth Micallef acknowledged that the programme's "artistic copyright" belonged to "Antoine Muscat or Kenneth Mizzi".

The judge noted that this admission sat uneasily with the company's insistence that the programme had undergone "radical changes" after Muscat's departure.

Micallef also conceded that, after Muscat's departure, the station had effectively taken over production and begun paying the presenters directly. Judge Spiteri Bailey said the court had "no doubt" that Muscat had created works deserving of copyright protection.

He said the court was "not convinced" by ONE Productions' argument that the programme had been substantially transformed after Muscat's exit, remarking that the evidence "painted a different picture".

The court concluded that ONE Productions had "contravened and is contravening" Muscat's rights under the Copyright Act. It also found that his moral rights had been infringed.

The court found that Muscat had been omitted from the credits despite it being both "practicable and easy" to identify him as the programme's author.

For five years, the programme's end credits identified ONE Productions as the holder of all rights while failing to acknowledge Muscat as the author.

The broadcaster had "deceitfully" presented itself as the holder of all rights, even as it continued using work created by Muscat without either seeking his permission or acknowledging his authorship, the court said.

Programme ran at a loss

Muscat had also sought restitution of profits, arguing that Espresso had generated more than €600,000 in advertising revenue during the years it remained on air after his departure.

He estimated that the programme had been broadcast around 1,429 times. However, auditors from Reanda Limited painted a very different picture.

The firm's managing director testified that once direct and indirect expenses — including studio costs, camera operators and overheads — had been factored in, the programme had racked up losses amounting to €232,797 between September 2016 and June 2022.

Muscat argued that the figures had been artificially inflated because they included fixed costs the station would have had to bear in any case.

The judge observed that it would be "very strange" for a broadcaster to keep a programme on air year after year if it was consistently losing money.

Nonetheless, he found no grounds for casting doubt on the audited accounts and declined to order restitution, since no profits had been shown to exist.

While the court ordered ONE Productions to stop using the Espresso set, furniture, props and signature jingle created by Muscat, the programme itself had already wrapped up in June 2022 after more than 1,700 broadcasts.