Boxoffice Pro Q1 2021

9
WARNER BROS.
SHATTERS THE WINDOW
December
The goodwill that Warner
Bros. earned from exhibitors
in its commitment to release
Christopher Nolan’s Tenet was
tested when the studio decided
to release Wonder Woman
1984 simultaneously for home
streaming on Christmas Day.
In regular circumstances,
the move would be met with
strong opposition from the
exhibition community—but
in this specific case, with
this specific studio, the
decision was met with muted
understanding. Cinemas
had suffered from a dearth
of high-profile titles since
Tenet’s September release;
Wonder Woman 1984 would
hit screens desperate for
content at a critical time. As
the studio had already suffered
a significant financial loss on
Tenet, few could blame Warner
for hedging its losses on the
superhero sequel.
Whatever goodwill was left
after that, however, was gone
once WarnerMedia CEO Jason
Kilar dropped a bombshell
announcement: Warner Bros.
would release its entire 17-
film slate day-and-date on
its streaming service, HBO
Max, at no additional cost to
subscribers throughout 2021.
The model treated cinemas
as a secondary distribution
channel, their traditional
exclusivity period pushed
to a full month after a film’s
streaming debut.
The fallout was swift.
Filmmakers Christopher
Nolan and Denis Villeneuve
excoriated the decision
publicly. “There is absolutely
no love for cinema, nor for the
audience here,” Villeneuve
told Variety. In unilaterally
breaking theatrical exclusivity,
Warner Bros. found itself in a
unique position: facing the ire
of dismayed exhibitors as the
only major studio to commit
to a theatrical release calendar
for all its major titles.
10
SAVE YOUR CINEMA
December
As weeks turned into months,
it became increasingly
evident that movie theaters
around the world were
facing an existential crisis.
Several key foreign markets,
whose countries had done
a better job managing the
pandemic, successfully
leveraged local films to take
the place of Hollywood titles
in welcoming audiences back
to the cinema. The United
States, however, had no such
advantage. Contending with
a barren release schedule,
some exhibitors voluntarily
reclosed some or all of their
locations—the cost of staying
open incurring greater losses
than going dark. Come
December, the industry was
nearing irrevocable damage.
Without government support,
NATO president and CEO John
Fithian estimated that as many
as two-thirds of the movie
theaters in the United States
could go out of business.
NATO’s role in the
pandemic was concentrated
on two principal projects:
the launch of CinemaSafe in
September and an ongoing
effort to secure government
aid for movie theaters. The
public-facing side of the
campaign, Save Your Cinema,
coordinated over 365,000
letters of support to all 535
members of Congress. The
effort culminated with the
inclusion of small and midsize
movie theaters in the
larger Save Our Stages Act,
giving eligible theaters a slice
of $15 billion in government
funding dedicated to event
venues. The bill’s passage
in the waning days of 2020
provided a crucial economic
lifeline for cinemas as they
entered an uncertain 2021.
Q1 2021
57
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