I am still a little fuzzy on what kind of legal issues there might be when using real life to base fictional stories on. Can someone sue you for making a movie that has a character that closely resembles them and in fact is based on them? We hear things like the names have been changed to protect the innocent but then there is the statement that this is not based on any real life and any similarities are accidental. The questions is can I right about jobs I had when I was a kid and the people that I worked with and girlfriends, family and others and not worry about law suites? I can change the names of the places and people to hide it to some extent but people who know me and things about my life will be able to pinpoint who it is that I wrote about? I have many good stories that I would like to tell but some of these people will not like it if they see that it's about them. Including family. My family is dysfunctional which makes for a lot of moving stories but I could see one of them suing me. Isn't there artistic protection of some kind? Anyone have thoughts or suggestions?
