Just weeks after Endemol Shine North America announced it would develop a television series about Tejano music queen Selena’s love story with her husband Chris Perez, the project faces a legal roadblock. The late singer’s father, Abraham Quintanilla, Jr. on Friday filed a suit in a Texas court against Endemol and Perez to stop production of the series, alleging that only Selena’s estate has the right to her name, image and “to author or authorize and commercially exploit a book, play, video, film, TV movie” about her life. The documents state that in 1995, after Selena's death, Perez and others entered a legal agreement about the late singer's estate.
– For fans looking forward to watching Selena Quintanilla and Chris Perez's love story play out on screen, don't get your hopes up too high. A TV series about the relationship was just announced two weeks ago, but now Quintanilla's father is suing Perez, her widower, to stop production, E! reports. The series was to be an adaptation of Perez's 2012 book about his romance with Quintanilla, the iconic "queen of Tejano music" who was murdered by her fan club president in 1995 when she was just 23. The couple married in 1992. In the lawsuit, Abraham Quintanilla Jr. says that, per an Estate Agreement entered into after Selena's murder, only Quintanilla Jr. holds the rights to "Entertainment Properties," a broad category that includes the use of Selena's name, voice, signature, and photographs. Per the suit, Perez agreed to that in exchange for receiving, "among other things," 25% of "net profits derived from the exploitation of the Entertainment Properties." Perez "doesn’t have the rights to publish a book or produce a television series based in any part on Selena," a Quintanilla estate attorney tells Forbes.