As the year draws to a close, it's time for an annual tradition for entertainment nerds: things going into public domain. For works that premiered prior to 1978, the period of copyright protection is tied to the premiere publication. The work enters public domain 95 years after that date, which means this year we're getting things that were originally published in 1929.

And this isn't just nerd territory. This new list of public domain works can pretty quickly affect the entertainment world, with artists jumping on newly inexpensive ways to adapt some very well-known material (without paying royalties to authors' estates).

F. Scott Fitzgerald's seminal novel The Great Gatsby passed into public domain in 2021, and in the few years since, we've seen that book transformed into two major musicals, an immersive party experience, and a final encore run of a pre-existing Off-Broadway play that used the complete and unabridged text of the novel as its script. Show Boat, the (arguably) first major musical to pass into the public domain last year, is getting a new adaptation in New York via Target Margin Theatre's Show/Boat: A River, part of 2025's Under the Radar Festival.

READ: If You've Ever Wanted to Rewrite Show Boat, Now's Your Chance

So, what can we expect from this year's crop of new public domain titles?

First things first. 1929 didn't turn out to be a super notable year for plays and musicals, so there's no Show Boat-level title entering public domain this year.  The vast majority of the plays that debuted in 1929 are seldom if ever performed today, though that list does include Patrick Hamilton's Rope (or Rope's End), and Elmer Rice's Pulitzer-winning Street Scene (the play from which Kurt Weill's 1946 opera was adapted).

As for musicals, you're unlikely to have even heard of the shows that debuted in 1929 much less have had any opportunity to see them. It wasn't a banner year for Broadway, and given what was coming at the end of the year, that might not be altogether shocking. But you've definitely heard of some of the songs that debuted in 1929 musicals, which are also passing into public domain. Cole Porter had two shows that year with Fifty Million Frenchmen and Wake Up and Dream. The former debuted "You Do Something to Me," while the latter introduced "What is This Thing Called Love?" Oscar Hammerstein II and Jerome Kern put up a forgotten musical titled Sweet Adeline that year, which debuted their song "Why Was I Born?" The Little Show, a revue mostly comprising songs by Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz, gave us "I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plan" and "Can't We Be Friends?", the latter by Kay Swift and Paul James. The Gershwins also had a musical that year, Show Girl, which introduced "Liza (All the Clouds'll Roll Away)." 

One of the bigger songs from the year came in the revue Hot Chocolates, from which we get Thomas "Fats" Waller, Harry Brooks, and Andy Razaf's "Ain't Misbehavin'."

Some other notable songs that didn't come from Broadway will also be losing copyright protection in 2025, including Arthur Freed and Nacio Herb Brown's "Singin' in the Rain" and "You Were Meant For Me," and Milton Ager and Jack Yellen's "Happy Days Are Here Again." There's also Gershwin's jazz symphonic tone poem An American in Paris. Only the original musical work is going into public domain, not the film or Broadway musical that it would inspire.

The remainder of things newly entering public domain will primarily be interesting to Broadway fans if they lead to new adaptations. Novels losing their copyright protection include Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon, and Agatha Christie's Seven Dials Mystery. For films, we're getting the first Marx Brothers feature film The Cocoanuts, the first Best Picture Academy Award-winning movie musical The Broadway Melody, Hitchcock's first sound film Blackmail, the 1929 mostly silent film version of Show Boat, and Gold Diggers of Broadway. We also got 12 more Mickey Mouse cartoons, including the first to include the character talking and wearing his signature white gloves.

And speaking of Mickey Mouse, some other well known characters are entering public domain and will become eligible for new royalty-free derivative works. Perhaps most notable of that list is Popeye the sailor man, who debuted in 1929. His spinach-eating tendencies didn't enter the scene until 1931, but according to researchers at Duke University, you'll still be clear to include that character trait due to some lazy copyright management in the '50s. Also coming into public domain is Tintin and his dog, Snowy. The Belgian cartoon is an adventurous reporter who gets into various sticky situations while chasing stories. As with Steamboat Willie-era Mickey Mouse last year, anyone wanting to use these characters will have to make sure that they are steering clear of character traits or visual material that debuted after 1929.