I’ve watched this thing morph into what it should be, and what other things haven't been and could have been, just by virtue of perspective.” 
 
 Oyelowo and DuVernay had received the ultimate imprimatur of that perspective just a few weeks ago, when Oprah Winfrey — who has a cameo role in “Selma” and is one of the film’s producers — played host at a screening of the film in Santa Barbara, for members of King’s family and several of the real-life activists who are portrayed in the film, including Nash, Rep. John Lewis and former U.N. ambassador Andrew Young. The litigious MLK estate, controlled now by King’s descendants, has a long history of employing copyright to restrict the use of King’s speeches. What’s more, “Selma,” which opened in Washington on Thursday, makes the bold move of dispensing with King’s most familiar and famous speeches: Working with an original script by Paul Webb, DuVernay carefully paraphrased King’s oratory, so that the words Oyelowo speaks in the film have King’s cadence and meaning, even when they’re not literal. “Because we knew those rights are already gone, they’re with Spielberg, and secondly we found a way to do it where we didn’t have to ask for permission, because with those rights came a certain collaboration.” 
 
 The result is a fascinating portrait that both eerily captures King, but also feels just a tick off from impersonation.  The new film Selma has sparked a bitter public debate, mostly concerning the film’s representation of President Lyndon Johnson’s stance on voting rights and how much artistic license is appropriate for a biopic centering on a major historical event. During the summer of 2013, as the nation was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, the MLK estate restricted broadcasts of “I Have a Dream,” but it did not lock down the speech altogether: It authorized sales of DVDs of the speech, and it licensed AT&T to use segments of the speech in cell phone ads. Apple, Chevrolet, and Mercedes have been able to use King’s words in their commercials only after paying hefty licensing fees. “All of this despite the foundation paying MLK children through King, Inc., $2.7 million to use the likeness of King and his quotes on the memorial on the National Mall.” 
 
 Family lawyers hunt down scholars who would use King’s words. The MLK estate also sued the producers of Eyes on the Prize, an Emmy-winning documentary series on the civil rights movement, for the use of unlicensed footage of King speeches. Subconsciously there is an allergy to it.” 
 
 This is why, historically, films that have dealt with the civil rights movement have so often been told through the journey of a white character, whether a white FBI agent in “Mississippi Burning” or a well-meaning college girl in “The Help,” Oyelowo suggested. “It was important to have them in the script, because they weren’t, previously,” DuVernay said, “just to have them named and have them present.” DuVernay added that she insisted on including a scene when they tell King that Selma’s the right place for the upcoming demonstrations.
– The new film Selma avoided quoting Martin Luther King's civil-rights speeches because his family owns the copyrights and has sued over them—and it's all perfectly legal, Politico reports. The MLK estate has successfully sued USA Today, CBS News, and the Emmy-winning documentary series Eyes on the Prize, keeping it out of circulation for years. The Kings also raked in $700,000 over the MLK Memorial in Washington, DC, and have licensed King's speeches for ads by Apple, Mercedes, Chevrolet, and Alcatel. "We never even asked" for the rights, Selma director Ava DuVernay tells the Washington Post. She knew DreamworksSKG owns them for a future Steven Spielberg film, and that "with those rights came a certain collaboration"—ie, estate influence over King's portrayal. Why is it legal? Because King was a private citizen, not a government official, so his speeches and writings were his and passed onto his estate. What's more, Congress has extended copyright protection to the author's life plus 70 years (matching international standards), so MLK's work will become public domain on Jan. 1, 2039. The family has mostly kept quiet about all this, USA Today reports, but one of King's sons, Dexter, has written that "people don't want us, as the heirs, the estate, to benefit ... or for my family to be in any way comfortable." Yet the estate does have limits: It initially demanded $20,000 from Clarence Jones, King's personal attorney and speechwriter, for including the "I Have a Dream" speech in a book—but Jones published anyway, and the estate backed off, the National Review reports.