Zorro, The Gay Blade Zorro, The Gay Blade Zorro, The Gay Blade is a 1981 swashbuckling comedy film from 20th Century Fox, produced by C.O. Erickson and George Hamilton, directed by Peter Medak, that stars Hamilton, Lauren Hutton, Ron Leibman, and Brenda Vaccaro. Via its dedication to director Rouben Mamoulian and opening prologue, the film establishes that it is a sequel to 20th Century Fox's swashbuckling adventure film "The Mark of Zorro" (1940). Hamilton was nominated for a Golden Globe award for playing the dual role of Don Diego de la Vega (Zorro) and his gay twin brother Bunny Wigglesworth, né Ramón de la
Zorro Inc., argued that it owned the copyright to the original character because Johnston McCulley assigned his Zorro rights to Mitchell Gertz in 1949. Gertz died in 1961, and his estate transferred to his children, who created Zorro Productions, Inc. Fireworks Entertainment argued that the original rights had already been transferred to Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. in 1920 and provided documents showing this was legally affirmed in 1929, and also questioned whether the copyright was still valid. The court ruled that "since the copyrights in "The Curse of Capistrano" and "The Mark of Zorro" lapsed in 1995 or before, the character Zorro