HARTFORD, Conn. — This is going to make his hair stand up.
“Jersey Shore” star Paul “Pauly D” DelVecchio was slapped with a $4 million trademark infringement lawsuit Thursday from a Connecticut DJ who claimed his business has been ruined by comparisons to the MTV personality.
Paul Lis of South Windsor, Conn., said he spent 40 years building up a reputation as the region’s “DJ Paulie” before DelVecchio began calling himself “DJ Pauly D” on television.
Suddenly, Lis found himself eclipsed by the overnight success of the MTV show and DelVecchio, the Rhode Island native who famously brought a suitcase of hair gel to the first season of filming to keep his locks vertically coiffed.
“He formally trademarked the name ‘DJ Paulie’ and then came the ‘Jersey Shore’ which basically wiped him off the face of the map,” attorney Jose M. Rojas told NewsCore.
The lawsuit alleges that MTV itself flooded the internet with so much “Jersey Shore” content that it was virtually impossible to find Lis’ information or advertise on his website.
MTV spokeswoman Noelle Llewellyn did not respond to a request for comment.
Rojas said he sent a cease-and-desist letter to the network last March asking them to stop promoting DelVecchio as “DJ Pauly D.” But MTV did not comply with the request — or even respond to it, Rojas said.
Meanwhile, DelVecchio applied for a slew of US patents attempting to copyright his own moniker.
In the applications, DelVecchio claimed his business was substantially different from Lis’, and that the chance of anyone mixing up the two was remote. But all were denied, according to the complaint.
The lawsuit, filed in US District Court in Hartford, asked for $4 million from MTV, DelVecchio and a host of his other employers, including The Palms Las Vegas, which pays him to be the official DJ of their pool.
Rojas said the damages figure included “quantifiable and intangible” harm that Lis has suffered.
“The reality television show [follows] a group of young adults pursuing a debauched lifestyle suggestive of loose morals, violence, intoxication and liberal profanity — the exact opposite of the reputation the Plaintiff, ‘DJ Paulie’ that[sic] he had spent decades cultivating,” the lawsuit alleged.
MTV has until Sept. 30 to file a motion-to-dismiss the claim.
DelVecchio is currently in Seaside Heights, N.J., filming the fifth season of “Jersey Shore.”