Opinion ID: 575827
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Application of the Legal Principles

Text: 16 In its complaint, appellant referred to six articles that appeared in the Globe between September 22 and October 7, 1989. One of those articles is not discussed in the brief on appeal, and we therefore assume that appellant does not seek review of the district court's decision with respect to that article. 5 Appellant does argue in its appellate brief, however, that another article, one not cited in the complaint, was defamatory. The story,  'Phantom' Confusion Still Flaring, was published on October 13, 1989, before appellant filed its complaint. We believe this article is not properly before us, and therefore decline to consider it. 6 Accordingly, we turn to our consideration of the remaining five articles. 17 In our view, most of the challenged language is easily identified as non-actionable under the principles outlined in Milkovich. Many of the statements cited in the complaint and appellate brief either constitute obviously protected hyperbole or are not susceptible of being proved true or false. Such, for example, is the language in The phantom of the 'Phantom'  quoting a critic who described the Hill production as a rip-off, a fraud, a scandal, a snake-oil job. Not only is this commentary figurative and hyperbolic, but we also can imagine no objective evidence to disprove it. Whether appellant's Phantom is fake or phony is similarly unprovable, since those adjectives admit of numerous interpretations. See McCabe v. Rattiner, 814 F.2d at 842 (The lack of precision [in the meaning of the word 'scam'] makes the assertion 'X is a scam' incapabable of being proven true or false.) 7 18 Appellant's claim of defamation is patently deficient with respect to one news story, Ticket buyers are still hot for 'Phantom,'  because the article lacks any even arguably defamatory assertions. Appellant's brief points to the following language: 19 The production is being billed as the Original London Stage Musical but is in no way related to the Andrew Lloyd Webber Phantom that was a smash hit in London and has broken all ticket records in New York since it opened in Janaury, 1988. 20