Eleven P.M.

Eleven P.M. is a silent film written, directed by, and starring Richard Maurice, produced by the Detroit-based Maurice Film Company. As a work published in 1928, its copyright status in the United States was governed by the 1909 Copyright Act, which required a registration followed by a renewal in the 28th year of the initial term. Extensive searches of the Stanford Copyright Renewal Database and the Library of Congress Catalog of Copyright Entries (CCE) show no record of copyright renewal for this title. Under the law applicable to works published between 1928 and 1963, failure to renew within the strictly defined window (the 28th year) resulted in the work falling into the public domain. Most 'race films' from this era produced by independent Black-owned studios like the Maurice Film Company did not have their copyrights maintained or renewed, often due to the studio's dissolution shortly after production.