James Cameron once said 'Avatar' Neytiri design began with a young Qorianka Kilcher. Now, she's suing
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“Yellowstone” and “The New World” actor Q’orianka Kilcher has taken legal action against filmmaker James Cameron, Disney and others she says used her likeness in the wildly lucrative “Avatar” film franchise without her knowledge.Kilcher, 36, filed her complaint Tuesday in California Central District Court and is suing on numerous counts including misappropriation of likeness, invasion of privacy and interfering with possible financial gain.
She is seeking an unspecified amount in damages and a jury trial.The parties involved in the making of the “Avatar” film series “commercially exploited [Kilcher’s] likeness in developing and continuing the Avatar franchise” and “systematically avoided alerting or crediting her,” the lawsuit states.Disney and a legal representative for Cameron did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
Cameron’s production company Lightstorm Entertainment, a California-based laser scanning studio and a New Zealand-based VFX firm are also among the co-defendants.For all the hugeness of an arena show, the singer establishes remarkable closeness with her fans, a rapport captured by the “Avatar” director’s hi-def cameras.The claim at the core of Kilcher’s lawsuit is that Cameron in 2005 “extracted, replicated and commercially deployed her facial likeness” from a photo of a 14-year-old Kilcher as Pocahontas in the Terrence Malick film “The New World” and used it to inform the facial characteristics of Neytiri, a key character in the “Avatar” franchise played by Zoe Saldaña.
Cameron spoke of Kilcher’s influence on the character in an interview with French YouTube channel Konbini.In the video, published in 2024 and noted in the lawsuit, James references the original sketch work for Neytiri.
“The source for this was a photograph that was in the L.A.Times as part of the promotion for ‘Th...