As new leaders assume power in Hollywood, the town is trying to deal with their operating styles.
“Why are you bothering me?” That was Jack Warner’s usual way of opening a meeting in a previous generation. “You have four minutes,” was Lew Wasserman’s opening for a one-on-one session.
While Hollywood’s earlier studio chiefs could be abrasive, their successors today are at once more polished and less available. Instead of one-on-one encounters with executives or filmmakers, they prefer to Zoom or text or schedule corporate presentations.
The new boss of Paramount-Skydance-Warner Bros, David Ellison, has favored techno-speak in his carefully produced opening messages to staff or shareholders. He’s insistent that a $79 billion corporate debt should not inhibit his planned $30 billion spend on content. Takeovers do not have to constrain creativity, he asserts.
At Disney, Josh D’Amaro, the soft-spoken new CEO, avoids theatrics in assuring his 230,000 employees that “imagination and innovation” would prevail importantly in his vast nation-state. Growth can be achieved without systematic price increases on theme park rides or cruises or streamers.
In response to these lofty aims, the recent messages from the ranks of entrenched executives have been robustly competitive. Netflix’s leaders promise not only an expanded slate but also a doubling down on two sectors presumably neglected in the present marketplace: A growing proportion of series and movies will be based on original stories, especially comedies.
Further, Netflix subscribers, who watch about seven movies a month, will also be offered four “event films” annually from filmmakers like David Fincher and Greta Gerwig (he’s prepping Cliff Boothshe’s prepping Narnia).
“If there’s a great movie out there we’ll either build it or acquire it,” promises Dan Lin, Netflix film chairman.
All of this is receiving a skeptical reception from a rival and more senior decision-maker, Sony’s Tom Rothman, who urges his brethren to focus more on institutional problems than film titles or genre.
Rothman, 71, reminds industry colleagues that ticket sales have declined 37% over the past six years, reflecting several disturbing trends in pop culture.
In contrast to the studied corporate styles of his younger competitors, the animated, often argumentative Rothman points out, for example, that “the theatrical window is badly cracked at this moment.” He adds: ”The stakes are high and the ultimate verdict will depend on how the industry’s players respond to this critical moment.”
Rothman points out that “some films are available on pay-per-view at home only 17 days after being released in theaters, while some go on streaming services in 30 days.”
Rothman has experimented with alternate plans to solve the “window crisis” and praises rival Universal for announcing a five-week theatrical window for most of its movies.
At one well-attended public session Rothman complained, “I’m bored listening to people who talk about celebrating movies when they do little about saving them.” When, seated next to him, I told him I was pleased by his performance, he seemed disappointed by the absence of a debate.
