## Facts

- Norton Styne claimed an oral agreement to provide services to entertainer Connie Stevens in exchange for compensation tied to certain revenues.
- Stevens later refused to pay, and Styne sued for amounts allegedly owed under the oral agreement.
- Stevens asserted that Styne’s services included procuring professional employment for her, constituting talent agency activity under the California Talent Agencies Act (TAA) without a license, making the contract illegal and void.
- The trial court denied Stevens’s summary judgment motion, initially concluding Styne’s activities were not governed by the TAA.
- At trial, the court refused Stevens’s requested jury instruction on the TAA illegality defense; the jury awarded Styne about $4.3 million.
- Post-trial, the trial court denied judgment notwithstanding the verdict but granted a new trial, concluding it had erred by refusing the TAA instruction.
- The Court of Appeal reversed the new-trial order and reinstated the verdict for Styne, reasoning the TAA could not be used by Stevens due to the TAA’s one-year limitations period and lack of referral to the Labor Commissioner.

## Issues

1. Whether the TAA’s one-year limitations provision for an “action or proceeding” “brought pursuant to” the Act bars a defendant from asserting TAA illegality as a defense in a civil contract action filed after one year.
2. Whether the TAA’s requirement that controversies “arising under” the Act be referred to the Labor Commissioner bars a court from considering a TAA-based illegality defense absent prior administrative referral.
3. Whether the trial court abused its discretion in granting a new trial based on failure to instruct the jury on the TAA illegality defense.

## Decision

- The California Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeal and reinstated the trial court’s order granting a new trial.
- The TAA’s one-year limitations period does not preclude using TAA illegality defensively; it limits only affirmative actions or proceedings brought under the TAA.
- The Labor Commissioner referral provision does not categorically bar courts from considering TAA-based defenses in ordinary civil litigation.
- The trial court acted within its discretion in granting a new trial because Stevens was entitled to a jury instruction on her illegality theory supported by substantial evidence.

## Legal Principles

- A contract for talent agency services performed by an unlicensed person under the TAA is illegal and void from inception, and unenforceability may be raised as a defense to a civil action on the contract.
- The one-year limitations period in Labor Code § 1700.44(c) restricts affirmative actions or proceedings brought pursuant to the TAA, not the defensive assertion that a contract is unenforceable due to illegality.
- Labor Code § 1700.44(a) does not strip courts of jurisdiction to address TAA illegality as a defense, although courts may stay proceedings and refer specific questions to the Labor Commissioner under primary-jurisdiction principles when the issue falls within the agency’s special competence.
- A party is entitled to jury instructions on a defense theory supported by substantial evidence; failure to instruct can justify a new trial.

## Conclusion

The court held that TAA-based contract illegality can be asserted defensively despite the Act’s one-year limitations period and without mandatory prior referral to the Labor Commissioner, and it reinstated the new-trial order because the jury was not instructed on the illegality defense.


Styne v. Stevens, 26 Cal. 4th 42 (Cal. 2001)