Lion King composer lawsuit

Photo Credit: Lebo M for Spotify

A ‘Lion King’ composer sued a comedian over a joke and now owes $40,000 in legal fees after the lawsuit failed to gain traction.

In July, a Los Angeles judge dismissed a $27 million defamation lawsuit that Lion King composer Lebo M had filed against a comedian who joked about one of his iconic songs. Now, the composer must cough up nearly $40,000 in legal fees after the comedian, Learmore Jonasi, successfully argued that the case was frivolous from the start.

Lebohang Morake, a South African singer and composer known professionally as Lebo M, has worked on Disney’s Lion King franchise for decades, including the first film’s iconic opening song, “The Circle of Life.” The track begins with a now-famous Zulu chant, “Nants’ingonyama bagithi Baba,” written and performed by Lebo M, which translates to “All hail the king; we all bow in the presence of the king.”

In February, Learmore Jonasi appeared on the podcast One54 Africa, where he joked that the chant actually translates to, “Look, there’s a lion, oh my god.” The clip went viral on social media, earning over 115,000 likes on the podcast’s Instagram and 337,000 views of the episode on YouTube.

But the composer clearly wasn’t laughing. He filed a lawsuit, demanding $27 million in damages and accusing Jonasi of defamation, calling the remark a “fabricated, trivializing distortion, meant as a sick joke for unlawful self-profit.”

Jonasi was quick to move to dismiss the lawsuit, with his attorneys arguing that it was completely frivolous and targeted his “core First Amendment protections” by attempting to punish a comedian for a joke.

“Because the First Amendment is so important in our society, the court should […] not allow Plaintiff to twist trademark law to suppress free speech,” Jonasi’s attorneys write.

Instead of fighting those arguments, Lebo M opted to drop the case altogether. In response, Jonasi’s legal team demanded that the composer repay the money the comedian spent defending the case.

In a ruling on Friday, Judge Josephine Statson granted that request under California’s anti-SLAPP law, which protects free speech against baseless lawsuits. The ruling awarded Jonasi just shy of $40,000 for over 50 hours spent by his attorneys in handling the case.