Originally Posted by
midnightman
If the Supremes had chose to leave Motown in 1965, they could've done what Mary Wells did when she left. Mary signed as a 17-year-old. When her contract expired in 1964 after she turned 21, she hired a lawyer who told her that she could argue her contract with Motown was "invalid" because she was a minor at the time and that was how she got out of it. I believe Berry had the contract rules to change afterwards because he didn't wanna have any of his artists argue about contracts [[that didn't quite work with Stevie since he hired one of the smartest attorneys in the business, Vigoda, to have things go in Stevie's favor rather than Motown's).
Then again, the Supremes, when they renewed their contract in 1965, could've hired lawyers who told them "look, girls, your group's name is important, you need to make sure you get it trademarked so Mr. Gordy don't do nothing with that name". I'm sure that's how Otis and Melvin got "The Temptations" trademarked because how else were they gonna exist in the industry with Motown controlling their name?
They controlled the Marvelettes'. The Four Tops were the Four Tops BEFORE signing with Motown. I think Martha and the original Vandellas eventually got their name back in their possession [[not to mention a chunk of performing royalties they were probably denied when the group dissolved in 1972) after suing Motown in 1983 and 1989 [[Martha sued first and the original Vandellas - Rosalind and Annette - sued after; which probably explains why Martha didn't join Mary in the streaming bill push, just speculating).
But I think like the Marvelettes, the Supremes were LOYAL to Berry Gordy so they didn't question nothing. And since they were one of THE biggest acts of the '60s, they were wined and dined more than the other Motown acts who lived on crumbs compared to them save for Marvin [[who had the Gordy connections by technicality due to who he married), The Tempts and the Tops.
Also, when you start a group at 14, 15 years old, you're too naive. All you wanna do is sing. Education goes out the window since you're so determined to be a superstar. I mean, the Supremes each achieved their status before they were mature enough to understand what was really going on. They were all fresh out of high school when they made chart history. Just 20, 21 years old. Basically CHILD PRODIGIES. They bought into the "we are family" hype that the company told them so of course they weren't gonna question Motown about royalties or name possession or any kind of artistic control. Flo could've but she was going through so much, all she can do is rant and fight. Mary and Diana were so used to the good life and all of that [[by their own admissions), they couldn't really see how much people played them.
They each found out too late that they were being taken advantage of. Flo couldn't leave the label to use her Supremes connections to help out her post-Supremes career, Diana left with only $250,000 in her possession [[and she had three kids to support when she left) and had to invest in real estate and become a producer/executive producer of her concert shows, TV specials and albums and Mary basically had to do whatever she had to do to make sure she kept the finances right [[as far as I know, unlike Flo, she nor Diana never had to file bankruptcy and after Mary cut her husband Pedro out of the picture, she turned everything around for her).
I still wonder if Mary is still fighting to retain the Supremes name for her, the estate of Florence and Diana since if the name belongs to any of the members, it's those three.
And to note, they could've gotten control of things while still in Michigan rather than before they and the company relocated to California.
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