LOS ANGELES — A federal judge in Los Angeles has tentatively ruled for Cher in her lawsuit claiming Sonny Bono’s widow owes her $1 million in royalties for Sonny & Cher songs, according to court papers obtained Wednesday by City News Service.
U.S. District Judge John Kronstadt wrote in minutes issued late Tuesday that while he is “inclined to deny in part and grant in part” Mary Bono’s motion for summary judgment, he would consider the matter and issue a ruling.
Cher filed suit against the widow of her former partner/husband in the folk-pop duo in October 2021 in Los Angeles federal court.
Cher alleges that Bono’s estate, administered by his widow, improperly tried to terminate her rights in Sonny & Cher royalties for such hits as “I Got You Babe” and “The Beat Goes On.”
According to the complaint, the Bono Collection Trust claimed that its 2016 notices of termination to several music publishers also applied to Cher’s royalty rights.
Bono, 62, countered that the federal Copyright Act allows her to terminate the 50% right to royalties that Sonny Bono agreed to pay Cher when the ex-couple signed their divorce settlement in 1978.
Cher, now 77, and Sonny Bono married in 1964 and began performing under the name Caesar and Cleo, before switching to Sonny & Cher. In addition to their music, the couple built their celebrity via television, starring in the 1971-74 CBS variety show, “The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour.”
Their career as a duo waned by the mid-1970s, though each was successful on their own — Cher in movies such as “Mask” and “Moonstruck” and Sonny Bono as a California politician.
Sonny Bono was mayor of Palm Springs from 1988-92 and a Republican congressman from 1995 until his death in a skiing accident in 1998. He was succeeded by his widow, who served until 2013.
At the end of January, Cher’s bid to take control of her 47-year-old son Elijah Blue Allman’s finances through an emergency conservatorship was denied after a court in Los Angeles ruled there was not sufficient evidence of his alleged drug abuse.