Arts, Entertainment, and Sports Law

Last week, Harvard commemorated the centennial of the 1918 influenza pandemic that killed more than 50 million people worldwide with Outbreak Week, a series of events across the university.

A group of current and retired NFL players shared personal reasons for their activism and outreach in a conversation Friday at Harvard Law School, part of “Changing the Conversation to Change Criminal Justice,” a symposium sponsored by the School’s Bernard Koteen Office of Public Interest Advising, the Fair Punishment Project, and the Players Coalition.

On Jan. 5, New England Patriots Defensive Captain Devin McCourty, teammates Johnson Bademosi, Matthew Slater and Duron Harmon, and team president Jonathan Kraft participated in a 'Listen and Learn' event at HLS, organized by the Fair Punishment Project and the Office of Public Interest Advising, featuring panel discussions on inequities in the criminal justice system.

Executives representing the three most popular major sports leagues in the U.S. offered insights into the business and legal maneuvering behind the games, during the HLS 200 panel “A View from the Top.”

Polish-born lawyer and businessman Darius Mioduski ’90 applied to Harvard Law School not having known English five years earlier. That hopeful step led him on an adventurous career path, from starting out in international M&A and project finance, to his present role as part owner of Poland’s top football club.

From the Supreme Court, to the SEC, to an unidentified city under siege: legal analysis, memoir, a documentary and more works from HLS alumni.

Alex Spiro '08 has emerged in short order as the go-to lawyer for professional basketball players who get in trouble with the law in New York--just one slice of Spiro’s clientele, summarized by sports and culture website The Ringer as “the rich, the famous, and the restless.”

While the NFL’s player health policies and practices are robust in some areas, there are opportunities for improvement in others, according to the findings of a new report by researchers at Harvard Law School's Petrie-Flom Center -- the first comprehensive comparative analysis of health policies and practices across professional sports leagues.

Harvard Law Today recently spoke with three of the 11 Harvard Law School students who were selected as Cravath International Fellows this year, who traveled during winter term to Bogotá, Colombia, Paris, France and Singapore to pursue clinical placements and independent research.

Co-taught by HLS Professor Jeannie Suk Gersen and Nana Sarian, general counsel of Stella McCartney, “Fashion Law Lab,” a nine-day course offered at Harvard Law School during the January term, gave students the opportunity to role-play simulations of scenarios faced by general counsel working in the fashion industry.

The Football Players Health Study at Harvard University today released a set of legal and ethical recommendations to address a series of structural factors that affect NFL player health. The Football Players Health Study is a research initiative composed of several ongoing studies examining the health and wellbeing of NFL players.

Rebecca Tushnet, a leading First Amendment scholar, will join the faculty of Harvard Law School as the inaugural Frank Stanton Professor of First Amendment Law.

HLS hosted the fourth Celebration of Black Alumni in September, featuring the theme “Turning Vision into Action.” The actions of alumni who attended have resonated in courtrooms and classrooms, in elected office and the corner office, in communities and in the culture. The Bulletin spoke with five CBA participants about where their vision has led them and where they hope to yet go.

When Kelly Shapiro ’05 started her own entertainment law practice last year after stepping down as VP of a real estate investment trust, she had no intention of working on a TV show.

The force was with the 2016 Harvard Law School Parody, "Law Wars: Attack of the Loans." The Parody is an annual production of the Harvard Law School Drama Society.

Being an in-demand Hollywood screenwriter was not something Josh Singer '01 expected when he was at Harvard Law School.

Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred '83 recently spoke with Harvard Law Today reporter Jonathan Topaz ’18 about his time at HLS and some pressing issues facing the MLB.

A recent panel discussion of the movie "Spotlight" at Harvard Law School touched on legal issues, secrets and shame, and even a potential lawsuit against the filmmakers.

Jonathan Goldstein’s unconventional path helped propel him to success in the entertainment industry.

Peter Carfagna, lecturer on law and director of the Sports Law Clinic at Harvard Law School, recently spoke with the Harvard Gazette about the 'Deflategate' dispute and what impact the case may have on NFL players, and on the league.

The latest episode of the Radio Berkman podcast looks into the payment structure of streaming music services in light of the release of a Rethink Music Initiative report on "Transparency and Money Flows in the Music Industry".