A California judge has allowed Nirvana’s copyright infringement lawsuit against Marc Jacobs to proceed, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The lawsuit centers around a Marc Jacobs T-shirt, which the band says rips off their famous happy face logo.
The shirt in question was part of Marc Jacobs’ “Bootleg Redux Grunge” collection and features what appears to be a version of Nirvana’s asymmetrical smiley face logo. Instead of X’s for eyes, however, it has the letters M and J. And above the smiley face, the word “Nirvana” is replaced by the word “Heaven,” although it’s printed in a type-face roughly similar to the one Nirvana used on their shirts.
Nirvana filed their lawsuit against Marc Jacobs last December, accusing the fashion line of copyright and trademark infringement, false designation of origin and unfair competition. The band also alleged that Marc Jacobs used the happy face logo to “mislead the public into falsely believing that Nirvana endorses the entire ‘Bootleg Redux Grunge’ collection… when Nirvana has not done so.”