John J. Tormey III, Esq. is a veteran entertainment law
attorney with 30+ years of experience, now entering his fourth decade of the
practice of law. With degrees from Harvard and UCLA, John is admitted to practice in New York,
California, and the District of Columbia. John’s past positions include tours
of duty as a litigator at Pryor, Cashman, Sherman & Flynn, as Counsel to
The Walt Disney Company in Disney’s Corporate Legal Department, and as Senior
Counsel and Senior Litigation Counsel to Disney-owned Miramax Films thereafter
during the height of the independent film movement in the TriBeCa neighborhood
of lower Manhattan.
John was born in
Nurnberg, Germany, into a family of entertainers. John’s father
was a child performer in the 1940’s who became a stage actor and then a film
and TV actor, and John’s mother was an actress and a model. John himself
therefore grew up with Broadway and off-Broadway, Shakespeare and Moliere in
repertory, industrials, children’s theatre, and musical theatre on tour
throughout the American northeast and Midwest, working technical crew along the
way. John was a baseball pitcher whose coaches included Dick Howser and whose teammates
included Todd Stottlemyre. John then worked as a rock musician for years and
his former band-mates included John (“Jojo”) Hermann (of Widespread Panic), Tom
Morello (of Rage Against The Machine), Alison Brown (of Compass Records), and
jazz saxophonists Don Braden and Avram Fefer. Over the span of his career John
J. Tormey III, Esq. has dealt with virtually all aspects of the entertainment
and media businesses. John has been interviewed and featured in numerous
on-line and off-line articles and publications relating to the entertainment
field, as well as television appearances on New York’s COURT TV and other
programs.
John has achieved the level of “AV Preeminent®” from Martindale-Hubbell™. This is the highest possible Peer Review rating in legal ability & ethical standards given by
Martindale-Hubbell™. Additionally, in
2013, he was selected a “2013 Top Rated Lawyer in Intellectual Property” by
American Lawyer Media, a leading provider of news and information to the legal
industry. John is also a published author, with his work titled “Subliminal
Projection in the Media”, Entertainment, Publishing and the Arts Handbook
(Clark Boardman Company, Ltd., New York, NY; 1987).
Member, FBI New York Citizens’ Academy (2010). Member, FBI Citizens’ Academy, New York Alumni Association. Member, Rockland County (New York) Police & Public Safety Academy, Citizen Police Academy (Spring, 2003).