NEW YORK — By all rights, Deborah Gregory should be sitting pretty: As a first-time author, she wrote the Cheetah Girls novels, a bubbly, 16-book series that became hugely popular with American tweens and teens. And she appeared to hit an even bigger jackpot when she sold the dramatic rights to the Disney Channel.
Her breezy, street-smart tales of five girls chasing pop music careers were turned into two hit television movies, and a third is now being filmed in India. Cheetah Girls CDs and DVDs have sold in the millions, and concert tours have hit more than 80 cities. Meanwhile, Disney's fabled merchandising machine flooded the market with Cheetah Girls shoes, dolls, toothbrushes, video games, backpacks, note pads, pillows, posters, T-shirts and the like.
Gregory expected to get a piece of the action when she signed a 2001 contract promising her 4% of the net from all of this activity. But like many other authors who have signed away dramatic rights, she says she never got a penny of the profits. Unlike screenwriters, who were backed by a strong union in their recently ended strike, most literary writers are at a disadvantage when negotiating with Hollywood. And it is difficult, if not impossible, for them to crack the safe.
Indeed, Gregory said she's pocketed $125,000 over the last nine years in option fees and payments for her title as co-producer of the movies. Although she's asked for them, she has never gotten "net profit participation statements" from Disney, spelling out details of expenses and revenues. If anyone is getting rich on this formidable franchise, Gregory noted, it's not the woman who created it.
"People think I must be living in a palace, when they think of the success of the Cheetah Girls," she said, sitting quietly in the cramped studio apartment she rents in Manhattan. "But look at this place. It's a . . . dump."
Gregory, an imposing and outspoken African American, doesn't mince words. She has a saucy, cheerfully profane sense of humor that she struggled to keep in check during interviews, and her anger over what has happened is palpable.
Disney officials, asked to explain why Gregory has not received any net profits -- and to estimate the collective revenue that "the Cheetah Girls has generated -- declined to respond. "Disney Channel doesn't comment on the terms of its contracts," spokeswoman Patti McTeague said in an e-mail.
