What do you get when you cross Stephen King, a haunted toy monkey, and Disney’s use of cymbals? One weirdly delightful copyright twist that probably made The Monkey (2025) funnier and better than ever.
Bang the Drums
The Monkey is a short story by Stephen King which this year was adapted into a horror-comedy. The original short story features a classically creepy setup: an old toy monkey starts banging its cymbals, and someone dies every time it does. You know, classic King stuff. The original short story follows the life of a man named Hal Shelburn and how his life is disrupted by the cymbal-banging monkey toy. Every clang of the monkey’s cymbals signals a mysterious death, as if the monkey is conducting some unseen, malevolent orchestra[1]. The monkey in the short story was inspired by the famous toy also known as jolly chimp[2].
However, in the film adaptation, rather than the toy monkey having cymbals to clang it instead has a drum to bang.
Why? Because of that one terrifying monkey toy in Toy Story 3 (2010). Yup, the monkey toy who monitors the day-care security cams, shrieking and clashing those cymbals every time he spots a toy trying to escape from the evil rule of Lotso. That guy is the reason behind the change.
So when the director of The Monkey (2025), Osgood Perkins, was handed the project, the producers supposedly said:
“Oh, by the way, Disney owns the cymbals.”
—GamesRadar+ [3]
Now, instead of potentially getting lawyered into oblivion, Perkins had an idea: why not swap out the cymbals for a snare drum? A creepy little marching-band snare drum. And honestly, as someone who has seen the film, the drumming monkey ticks all my comedy-horror boxes (especially with the circus music that plays in the background when the monkey is drumming… perfection).
“It’s one of those things where a limitation becomes an opportunity,” Perkins said.
“The drum is like a marching drum. It’s like, ‘Drum roll, please!’ before something happens. That’s better than cymbals. So thanks, Disney. I prefer it!”
—GeekTyrant [4]
The IP Wrench
Now, there is a difference between owning the physical design of a toy monkey (like the kind you buy in a store) and the visual and stylistic design of that monkey when it appears in film or media. The former may be protected by filing for a registered design. In the UK, a registered design protects the appearance of a product: its shape, configuration, patterns, and ornamentation. If you wanted to stop others from manufacturing a toy that looks like yours, you would register the design with the UK Intellectual Property Office. However this doesn’t automatically stop someone from depicting a similar design in film or media. That’s where copyright comes in, especially when a visual or stylistic portrayal (like Disney’s menacing monkey in Toy Story 3 (2010)) becomes iconic in its own right.
Disney can be quite protective over their iconic depictions of characters in their media (see our previous blog posts about Winnie the Pooh and Mickey Mouse). Whilst the cymbal-clashing monkey toy is old enough to be in the public domain[5], however its representation in media, and in particular the evil cymbal-bashing kind as shown in Toy Story 3 (2010), is Disney’s turf[6].
Therefore, the filmmakers of The Monkey (2025) were cautious about representing an evil cymbal-bashing monkey in their film given the Disney depiction, even though King’s depiction in the short story predates the depiction in Toy Story 3 (2010). The filmmakers didn’t want to take chances, hence the redesign.
As I stated earlier, the redesign probably heightened the comedy elements of the film. As famous Chinese philosopher Confucius is claimed to have said “the cautious seldom err” and being cautious in this case definitely paid off.
Conclusions
The Monkey (2025) stands as a reminder that even the seemingly weirdest creative details (i.e. an evil toy monkey) can come with outsized legal consequences. But instead of letting copyright fears kill the vibe, director Osgood Perkins embraced the challenge, swapped the clang for the bang of drum.
Remember, sometimes a copyright roadblock isn’t the end, it may be the start of something unexpectedly fun, weird, and better.
If you have any questions regarding the above, or if you have your own copyright or design issues, please do not hesitate to reach out to the author, or any other Scintilla attorney and we’d be delighted to help.
References
[1] https://stephenking.fandom.com/wiki/The_Monkey
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cymbal-banging_monkey_toy
[3] The Monkey director explains how a bizarre copyright issue actually improved the comedy horror movie: “Thanks, Disney!” | GamesRadar+
[4] “Thanks, Disney!”: THE MONKEY Director Explains How a Copyright Issue Improved His Horror Film — GeekTyrant
[5] https://www.lovetoknow.com/home/antiques-collectibles/monkey-playing-cymbals-vintage-toy
[6] https://filmstories.co.uk/news/disney-owns-the-copyright-to-monkeys-with-cymbals/
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