The Prince estate is now asking a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit by the late singer’s Purple Rain co-star Apollonia, who claims the estate is trying to “steal” her name.
In court filings Thursday, the estate (Paisley Park Enterprises LLC) says it has no intention of stopping the singer and actress (Patty Kotero) from continuing to use her stage name – and that her lawsuit was “improperly filed” over “hypothetical threats.”
“PPE has absolutely never insisted that plaintiff cease using Apollonia as her stage name, nor has PPE demanded that plaintiff cease any of her business activities,” writes L. Londell McMillan, a longtime Prince advisor and one of the managers of Paisley Park Enterprises. “I have personally told this to plaintiff several times.”
Apollonia, who rose to fame playing a character of the same name in Purple Rain, sued the estate last month, claiming it had “embarked on an aggressive campaign” at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to cancel her trademark registrations to the name. “There is only one Apollonia,” she wrote at the time.
But in Thursday’s response filing, the estate says it wanted to peacefully co-exist with her – and that it only took action at the USPTO because her existing trademark registration on “Apollonia” was blocking the estate’s own efforts to secure a trademark for “Apollonia 6,” the name of the Prince-founded girl group that Kotero led.
The estate says it had valid grounds to seek to cancel Kotero’s trademark, which it claims she obtained “during [the] chaotic period following Prince’s death.”
“Following his death, certain people with no ownership interest in Prince’s trademarks registered or applied to register marks that rightfully belonged to Prince,” McMillan writes in the court filings. “These same individuals never attempted such improper actions during Prince’s lifetime.”
Prince died of a fentanyl overdose in 2016 without a written will, and his affairs spent more than six years in probate court, as heirs, advisors and others battled over how the valuable estate would be managed in the future. The estate is now split evenly between Paisley Park Enterprises and another group controlled by Primary Wave (which is not involved in the current dispute).
Apollonia, whose song “Sex Shooter” from Purple Rain spent six weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1984, filed her lawsuit in August, claiming Paisley Park Enterprises’s litigation seeking to void her trademark registrations was threatening “to disrupt not only Apollonia’s livelihood, but also her identity.”
But in Thursday’s court filings, the estate says it never made such threats, meaning Apollonia has no grounds to sue: “Defendant has not demanded that Kotero give up her name, nor has defendant accused plaintiff of infringement,” the estate writes. “Plaintiff’s case should therefore be dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.”
Kotero’s lawyers didn’t immediately return a request for comment on Thursday. They’ll have a chance to respond to the estate’s motion to dismiss in the weeks and months ahead.