Abigail Spencer joins Oz the Great and Powerful; Warner Brothers gains control over Oz characters

Abigail Spencer, no not the little girl, that's Abigail Breslin, has joined the cast of Sam Raimi's Oz the Great and Powerful. The "prequel" of sorts to the classic 1939 The Wizard of Oz, will see James Franco as a travelling magician and snake oil salesman who is whisked away to the magical land by an errant balloon. There he meets the three witches we all know and love(played by Rachel Weisz, Michelle Williams, and Mila Kunis), and gets involved in their little family feud.  Zach Braff and Joey King(Ramona and Beezus) are in as well.

Spencer is probably best known for her brief run on AMC's Mad Men, but she'll be seen later this summer in Jon Favreau's Cowboys & Aliens. She'll also appear in the Chris Pine/Reese Witherspoon rom-com, This Means War. In Oz, she'll play a willing participant in the magician's tricks while in Kansas. Sounds like a very minor bit.

But that's really just kindof a blip on the Oz radar. The real news comes out of a courtroom, where the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has recently rendered a judgement giving Warner Brothers control over depictions of characters from The Wizard of Oz. The whole thing comes out of a lawsuit against a memorabilia company which had been using their likenesses, causing WB to sue since they own the rights to the 1939 film. Basically what the judge says is that characters can be copyrighted even if they're based on previous works, which pretty much gives WB some control over any remakes, adaptations, whatever that are based on the film. I'm not a lawyer and don't understand all the ins and outs of this, but what it sounds like to me is that movies like Oz the Great and Powerful may be in jeopary. Or some sort of deal may need to be struck. [THR]