Parker v. Twentieth
Century-Fox Film Corp.
Supreme Court of
3 Cal.3d 176, 89 Cal.Rptr.
737, 474 P.2d 689.
Facts: Shirley MacLaine had a contract with 20th
Century Fox to do a musical for $750,000.
Fox breached the contract and offered instead to give the plaintiff the
lead in a western for the same amount of money.
The plaintiff sued for the $750,000, and the trial court granted her
summary judgment.
Issue: Can a defendant’s offer of alternate employment
mitigate the damages from the breach of the original employment contract?
Rule: The damages to a wrongfully dismissed employee should
be the salary for the period of the contract minus the amount the employer
affirmatively proves the employee did earn or could have earned from another
similar job.
Analysis: The main reason the court upholds the summary
judgment is that the defendant failed to produce evidence supporting its
defense, thus no factual issue was raised.
The only defense is that the substitute offer of employment is
“substantially similar” to the originally offered employment.
In dissent, Chief Justice
Sullivan argues that the quality of the alternative employment proposed and its
similarity to the work offered in the contract is a question of fact that ought
to have been determined in a trial.
Conclusion: The court affirmed the trial court’s summary
judgment. Chief Justice Sullivan
dissented.
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Damages