IP Law Daily, COPYRIGHT—D. Conn.: Claims against Netflix and movie producers come up short in Mountain Queen lawsuit, (Jun 25, 2026)

By Matthew Hersh, J.D.

But the Nepali climber at the center of the lawsuit may still be on the hook for contract damages.

A filmmaker who claims that Netflix purloined his treatment for a documentary over a record-breaking female mountaineer failed to state a claim for copyright infringement because there were no substantial similarities between the four-page outline and the eventual movie, the District Court for the District of Connecticut has held. But the court, in dismissing the infringement claim against Netflix and a host of movie production companies involved in the documentary, found that the filmmaker could still proceed on a claim that the mountaineer breached her promise to give him the exclusive rights to her story (Blassberg v. Sherpa, No. 3:24-cv-02034-MPS (D. Conn. Jun. 23, 2026)).

The lawsuit was brought by Alan M. Blassberg, an American documentary filmmaker whose credits include the Emmy-nominated America's Deadliest Season: Alaskan Crab Fishing, the precursor to Deadliest Catch, and the award-winning documentary Pink & Blue: Colors of Hereditary Cancer. In 2014, he entered into a contract with Lhakpa Sherpa, the first Nepali woman to summit Mount Everest and the woman with the most successful Everest ascents in history. The contract, which was amended and extended through 2018, gave the producer the exclusive right to develop and produce an original television, film, or media account of Sherpa’s life and achievements as a mountain climber. The project did not come to fruition, and the contract expired by its terms at the end of 2018.

But the end of the collaboration with Blassberg was not the end of the line for the documentary. Several years later, prominent documentary filmmaker Lucy Walker premiered Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa. The film, which was financed by production companies SK Global Entertainment, OBB Pictures, and Avocados & Coconuts, follows Lhakpa’s life as a record-breaking mountaineer and a single mother working low-wage jobs in Connecticut while raising two daughters after escaping an abusive marriage. The documentary premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2023, where Netflix acquired worldwide distribution rights, and it debuted to critical acclaim on Netflix on July 31, 2024.

Blassberg, miffed, sued many of the people involved in the Netflix documentary. With respect to Sherpa, his lawsuit contended, she breached her contract by beginning talks with Avocados & Coconuts—the first production company involved—before the expiration of her exclusivity deal with Blassberg. As to Netflix and the production companies, he contended, they committed copyright infringement—and violated Connecticut unfair trade practices law—when they got access to his four-page project outline and adapted it for their own film.

The defendants moved to dismiss the lawsuit, leading to this opinion.

Copyright infringement. The court dismissed the copyright infringement claim. In order to do so, the court noted, it had to decide whether Blassberg adequately alleged access to the outline and, if so, whether he adequately alleged substantial similarity between that outline and the later film. Blassberg largely cleared the first hurdle, the court noted, but not the second.

Blassberg adequately alleged access, the court found, because he set forth a plausible chain of custody of the outline. To begin with, he alleged, he gave Sherpa and her brother copies of the outline at a pre-production meeting in Nepal. Shortly afterward, he contended, Sherpa began working directly with Avocados & Coconuts, which in turn later began working with the other production companies. It was “a reasonable inference,” the court found, that the outline passed from Sherpa to these companies. But that plausible chain of events, the court found, did not extend to Netflix, which only got involved once the file was complete. “Blassberg’s complaint makes no allegations connecting Netflix to this chain of events,” the court noted, “and therefore it fails to suggest that Netflix had a reasonable possibility of accessing the [o]utline.”

But while Blassberg would clear the hurdle of access against most of the defendants, the court found, he could not make even a threshold showing of substantial similarity. The Netflix documentary was “an inspiring documentary about Sherpa that focuses on her spirit of perseverance, climbing achievements, and personal history of overcoming domestic violence,” the court noted. In comparison, the court emphasized, the Blassberg outline was “a four-page list of ideas for a documentary centered around Sherpa’s eighth attempt at climbing Everest.” The outline contained “mostly unprotectable facts and scenes a faire,” the court found, and was “too rudimentary to convey any original overall concept or feel beyond that of a documentary about Sherpa’s eighth summit attempt.”

Beyond the overall concept and feel, the court found, there was no other metric by which the works could be found to be substantially similar. The Netflix movie focused on “Sherpa’s bravery and determination to escape the traditional roles for women in the society she was born into and to be freed from the abusive relationship she found herself in,” the court noted. As a secondary theme, the court noted, the Netflix move featured the story of Sherpa’s two daughters as they come to terms with the trauma of growing up in a household marked by domestic violence. “To the extent that a four-page outline can convey a theme,” the court observed, the outline’s theme was quite different, focusing largely on “Sherpa’s achievement of summitting Everest for the eighth time and contrasts that with her humble life in Connecticut.” While there were “a few sentences about her and her daughters’ history of abuse,” the court noted, “there is no mention of the secondary theme of her and her daughters’ efforts to resolve their trauma.” The court likewise found no substantial similarity in the plot, characters, sequence, pace, or setting.

CUTPA. The court also dismissed the trade practices claim. Blassberg contended that in using his outline with permission, the defendants committed a violation of the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act, Conn. Gen. Stat. §§ 42-110a et seq. But that claim was preempted by the Copyright Act, the court found, because it was based on the defendants’ alleged “misappropriation” of the outline. Blassberg contended that his CUTPA claim alleged an “extra element.” and was therefore not preempted, because the defendants failed to give him credit as a producer of the movie. “But neither of those actions would be deceptive, unfair, or contrary to public policy absent a Copyright Act violation,” the court observed. The CUTPA claim was therefore preempted.

Contract breach. But while the claim against Netflix and the production companies would fail, the complaint against Sherpa herself would continue—at least for now. While there were some ambiguities and “a few contradictory provisions” in the agreements, the court noted, it was still a plausible inference at this stage that Sherpa was bound by exclusivity until the end of 2018 or 2019. Moreover, the court noted, Blassberg at least plausibly alleged that Sherpa began working with Avocados & Coconuts in December 2018 on the project that evolved into the Netflix movie. But the court emphasized that “to reach this conclusion, I have had to draw all reasonable inferences in Blassberg’s favor, and even then, it is a close call.” The case would nonetheless continue.

The Case is No. 3:24-cv-02034-MPS.

Judge: Shea, M.

Attorneys: Joseph Bree Burns (Crumbie Law Group, LLC) for Alan M. Blassberg. Julia F. Fountain (Robinson & Cole LLP) for Lhakpa Sherpa.

Cases: Copyright ConnecticutNews GCNNews