Cher Must Cover Her Own Legal Fees After Royalties Court Fight

Cher has been ordered to pay her own legal fees following a long-running court battle with Mary Bono, the widow of her late ex-husband, Sonny Bono.

Court documents filed on July 21 show that U.S. District Judge John A. Kronstadt denied Cher's request to recover about $1.02 million in attorney's fees. The judge ruled that the dispute was based on contract law rather than federal copyright law, meaning the legal standard Cher relied on did not apply.

Cher sued Mary Bono in 2021, claiming she had wrongly withheld royalties from Sonny & Cher songs, including I Got You Babe and The Beat Goes On. Cher argued that her 1978 divorce agreement entitled her to 50% of those royalties and that Mary had improperly tried to end those rights under the Copyright Act.

In May 2024, Cher won the case, with the court awarding her more than $418,000 in unpaid royalties.

After the victory, Cher sought more than $1 million to cover her legal costs. However, Judge Kronstadt rejected that request, leaving the singer responsible for paying her own attorneys' fees. Court filings also estimated that roughly $10,000 in additional legal costs would be incurred in defending the fee request.

Sonny Bono and Cher were married from 1964 to 1975 and rose to fame as the music duo Sonny & Cher before later hosting The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour. Sonny later served as mayor of Palm Springs and as a U.S. congressman before his death in a skiing accident in 1998. He and Cher share one child, Chaz Bono.