Divorce attorneys representing Michael Douglas and his ex-wife Diandra are feuding over whether Diandra has the right to earnings from Douglas's upcoming Wall Street sequel. The movie in question is a sequel to the hit 1980s flick starring Douglas. In 2000, Douglass divorced Diandra, and as part of the divorce settlement, agreed to pay her 50% of his earnings from the original movie, which was released in 1987.
The sequel, “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps” is due out in September, and Diandra now claims that she is entitled to 50% of the earnings from the sequel, because the original movie was made at the time that she was married to Douglas. According to her, her divorce agreement entitles her to half of the earnings from any project that Douglas worked on while they were married, including, she insists, any spinoffs of any previous movies. The new Wall Street movie falls into that category, and hence, the dispute.
This is an intriguing case, and the outcome should be very interesting. Unless the agreement had a specific provision that Diandra would be eligible for 50% of the earnings from any sequels of movies that Douglas made while he was married to her, it does seem that her case has a poor foundation.
There's one moral of the story here that divorce lawyers in New Jersey would stress on- make sure that your final divorce settlement is cut and dry and absolutely watertight, with no room for ambiguity.
