Brad D. Brian who is representing the New Line/Time Warner. Not sure if any cares but I think he has a pretty impressive resume:
Brad D. Brian
Here is the link to the Tolkien Estate Lawyer and she also is equally impressive. I'll add a note to below:
Bonnie Eskenazi
Ms. Eskenazi is noted for some worth while items (she is out of Stanford Law School I believe):
Her first listing is the TE lawsuit and it states, "the Estate is seeking a damage award of at least $150 million and has also requested that the Court declare New Line’s rights terminated."
I've studied this case for fun of it: Bagdasarian Productions v. Universal Studios Successfully obtained the return of the "Alvin & The Chipmunks" characters to the original owners from a major motion picture studio.
Hmm, does the Chipmunk sound similar to the above statement on New Line losing righs? Universal had made movies and sold them on DVD etc for many years and then yank, the rights were pulled. This was based on a breach of contract also.
DIC Entertainment v. Speed Racer Enterprises: Successfully represented the children's animation company in an action concerning its intellectual property rights in the "Speed Racer" property
Stephen Slesinger Inc. v. The Walt Disney Co.: Represented the owners of rights in Winnie The Pooh in their action against Disney for fraud and breach of contract relating to Disney's obligation to pay royalties
want to do something fun, research the Pooh Lawsuit(s) that goes back to the 1980's and is still on going. Wikipedia has a quick overview with some links to papers if you don't want to look at papers, journals and legal case studies.
• Hans Zimmer v. The Walt Disney Co.: Successfully represented the Oscar-winning composer of "The Lion King" against Disney for failure to properly pay contractually required royalties for Disney's use of the "The Lion King" film score in a legitimate theatrical production
Her experience goes both ways and I have to say that I think were in for a roller coaster ride up and down. I truly hope that Time Warner does the right thing and pay what is truly due to the Estate.