A minor war of words broke out last week between Universal and the major theater chains when the studio was boastful about its streaming successes. While that was dialed down a little bit just days later, Disney might be about to ratchet things up again.
Disney CEO Bob Chapek essentially said the same thing as Universal in a recent conference call (via Variety), explaining that distribution for certain projects will have to be reevaluated. The suggestion is that we could see more films like Artemis Fowl heading straight to digital…
“We very much believe in the value of the theatrical experience overall for large blockbuster movies,” Chapek said. “We also realize that either because of changing and evolving consumer dynamics or because of certain situations like COVID, we may have to make some changes to that overall strategy just because theaters aren’t open or aren’t open to the extent that anyone needs to be financially viable.”
“We’re going to evaluate each one of our movies on a case-by-case situation’, he added.
Chapek makes a clear distinction between “blockbuster movies” and others on the Disney slate. It’s unlikely that we’ll see anything from Marvel Studios skip theatrical when there’s so much money on the line. But others that might be a little more risky, such as Artemis Fowl, may find a better fit with a VOD or Disney+ release.
