Disney owns the copyright to monkeys with cymbals

Why does the haunted toy simian in The Monkey play a drum rather than cymbals? A bizarre copyright quirk might have the answer…

If you’ve read Stephen King’s original short story, you might be wondering why Osgood Perkins’ The Monkey sees its titular simian swap its iconic cymbals for a big drum. The image of a ‘musical jolly chimp’ is hardly a new one, after all, and hardly a stranger to screens big or small. Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, The Simpsons and How The Grinch Stole Christmas are just a few examples of films and TV shows using musical monkey toys to great effect.

But it’s the little guy’s appearance in Toy Story 3 which might prove the most enduring, if only because it may well be his last. According to an SFX Magazine interview, a producer told The Monkey director Osgood Perkins “Disney owns the cymbals because of Toy Story” – presumably referring to a familiar-looking security guard in Toy Story 3.

This could just be Perkins’ producers being overly cautious, but it turns out our collective awareness of the specific toy that inspired King’s 1980 short story is all down to one very copyright-able image. While the design for the physical object currently seems to be owned by a Japanese company called Yamani (see below), the character of a sentient toy monkey holding cymbals and being generally evil is specific enough that a particularly canny Disney lawyer could theoretically sue for a breach of their image rights. Who knows – Pixar could be planning a “Monkey” Disney+ spin-off at this very moment.

Likely entirely by accident, then, it seems the very fact Disney included a cymbal-playing monkey in one of its films may have completely eradicated a piece of pop culture shorthand in the process – because no one reckons it’s worth the potential legal battle to test the waters. By our dodgy napkin maths, that means we can next expect evil cymbal-wielding chimps to make it to the big screen in 2105 – 95 years after the release of Toy Story 3 – despite the fact King’s short story pre-dates the film by a cool 30 years. Ain’t copyright law something?

Read more: The Monkey review | Osgood Perkins’ Longlegs follow-up is completely bananas

Incidentally, the toy traces its origins back to 1930s America, and before then to the whimsical friendship between organ grinders and their capuchins. It’s less harrowing than it sounds (but only just – check out the educational video below).

Charming. You can buy your own “Curious Cymbal-kun” here (always good to get your Christmas shopping done early), and The Monkey arrives in UK cinemas tomorrow.