Honestly, when you think of all the other insanity that 2020 has wrought, "Clint Eastwood sues CBD companies" seems downright tame. Maybe in an alternative universe where not everything is on fire, this would seem strange and bizarre but right now it's almost quaint that the actor and director has filed a pair of lawsuits against three different CBD manufacturers and 10 retailers of same which have all used quotes attributed to Eastwood in promotion of the produced which the Oscar winner claims he never gave.
Not only did these CBD companies allegedly use false quotes from the actor but they're also accused of using the Clint Eastwood name in the metadata of some of the websites selling the products, which would help to bring the sites up if somebody were to do a web search for Clint Eastwood. The two lawsuits filed in Los Angeles claim false endorsement, trademark infringement, and violation of common law.
Needless to say, this seems like it will be pretty simple and clear in court. Either Clint Eastwood made such statements or he didn't and it should be pretty easy to prove one way or the other. It certainly wouldn't be the first time a company tried to borrow the name of a famous person without permission, but obviously it runs a pretty serious risk.
And it seems like this isn't that unusual a practice. The Wrap reports that Ellen Degeneres and Sandra Bullock have filed similar lawsuits in the past. In addition, Tom Hanks has called out at least one ad for CBD products that used his likeness and a quote that claims to be from him. Hanks was unequivocal that he had never said such a thing.
It's unclear what the endgame here is supposed to be. Certainly, the CBD industry is huge and a lot of these companies are making a lot of money, so it may just be that the plan is for the eventual lawsuit to be part of the cost of doing business. The allegedly false endorsements help bring in the cash, and they use some of it, but certainly not all, to pay off the lawsuit when it eventually comes. Clint Eastwood's lawsuit is asking for a jury trial, but that, of course, doesn't mean this case will actually get that far. It's very likely we'll see this settled out of court. Unless, of course, one side or the other decides they really want to make a public case out of the thing.
Certainly, the lawsuit won't be moving forward overnight, but if it does go to trial, that fact could delay the lawsuit significantly since many courts either aren't functioning right now or are doing so very slowly. We'll have an idea where this is all going once we see the responses from those being sued.
