Even with the pandemic, Disney still stands as the top dog in the film industry; and the studio used that status to experiment with its 2021 film slate.
In a year where the studio tried theatrical exclusives, day-and-date streaming/theater releases, and streaming-only options, Disney still ended up on top of the domestic box office charts, with $1.12 billion grossed from 12 films, according to The Numbers. That just edged out the $1.1 billion total that Sony reached thanks to the end-of-year surge from “Spider-Man: No Way Home.” (This article will be updated with numbers from Comscore when end-of-year data is released.)
Armed with a Disney+ streaming service that grew to 118 million subscribers by year’s end, the studio streamed several of its theatrical titles via a “Premier Access” program that charged subscribers an extra $30 surcharge. It was a model that had been introduced with “Mulan” in 2020 and was used for films like “Raya and the Last Dragon” in March, “Cruella” in May and “Jungle Cruise” in late July.
But Premier Access became a sore spot when “Black Widow” star Scarlet Johannson slapped the studio with a lawsuit over lost bonuses promised in her contract based on box office performance. Disney’s response to the suit, accusing Johannson of showing “callous disregard” for the pandemic, got Disney in even more hot water, with several top industry names like SAG-AFTRA President Gabrielle Carteris and CAA co-chair Bryan Lourd slamming the studio publicly. Insiders told TheWrap that behind the scenes, Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige was fuming at Disney CEO Bob Chapek for how he handled a dispute with one of his biggest stars.
The hybrid theatrical/streaming strategy also inflamed theater owners — especially after Disney reported that $60 million of the $218 million worldwide opening for “Black Widow” had come from Premier Access and not from ticket sales that they would share. ”Combined with the lost theatrical revenue and forgone traditional PVOD revenue, the answer to these questions will show that simultaneous release costs Disney money in revenue per viewer over the life of the film,” NATO argued.
Over the next two months, Disney moved to ease the tension. The studio settled with Johansson for an undisclosed sum, and Chapek promised to “reset” how the company structures its deals with talent to account for streaming and day-and-date releases. And after September’s “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” became the first movie of the COVID era to gross over $200 million domestic, Disney announced that all of its remaining films for the year would play exclusively in theaters. The success of “Shang-Chi” was especially noteworthy since, unlike Black Widow, it introduced a brand-new superhero to the screen.
Even with numbers diminished by the pandemic, Disney was back in a familiar spot at year’s end, with five films in the top 10 domestic charts for the year. In addition to three Marvel films — “Shang-Chi” ($224.5 million domestic), “Black Widow” ($183.6 million) and “Eternals” ($164.7 million) — there was a Dwayne Johnson led spinoff of the theme park ride “Jungle Cruise” ($117 million) and an original action comedy starring Ryan Reynolds, “Free Guy” ($121.6 million).
That surprise hit also spotlighted the mixed success for films from the former 20th Century Fox that Disney acquired three years ago. After all, the division yielded two of last year’s biggest busts: Ridley Scott’s “The Last Duel” (which grossed $30 million worldwide) and Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story” ($48 million worldwide), both of which failed to make back their pricey $100 million production budgets.
And while the studio’s animated films struggled like those of the rest of the industry — November’s “Encanto” was eclipsed by Universal’s “Sing 2,” earning just $91 million domestically — the stable of crowd-pleasing IP puts Disney in prime position to get back to business as soon as COVID allows.
Forecast for 2022
If you need any proof that Disney is expecting a return to business as usual, just look at the 2022 slate. A trio of Marvel films headlines the lineup, including “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” a sequel to a hit that grossed $700 million in North America and $1.3 billion worldwide.
But the animated side of the slate has been thrown up in the air again as Disney announced on Friday that Pixar’s “Turning Red” will be pulled from theaters for a release on Disney+, following the path of fellow original Pixar titles “Soul” in 2020 and “Luca” in 2021.
While Disney has reserved the right to change its release plans based on “what is best for the consumer and our businesses” — meaning that Premier Access and moves to streaming have never been taken off the table — the fact that Disney made this move with “Turning Red” after experimenting with a theatrically exclusive animated release in “Encanto” shows that either Disney doesn’t feel that family turnout in theaters will be back to normal by spring or is making long-term changes to how it releases features from Pixar and Disney Animation.
We will find out more about Disney’s animated future with its other two feature releases: Pixar’s “Lightyear,” a spinoff based on the famous “Toy Story” hero that comes out in June, and Disney Animation’s “Strange World,” an ode to classic pulp adventure novels that comes out on Thanksgiving weekend.
And in the slots once held by “Star Wars” films, Disney will release two franchise offerings from its recent acquisition of 20th Century Studios. First will be “Bob’s Burgers: The Movie” on Memorial Day weekend and James Cameron’s much-delayed sequel to the all-time box office king “Avatar” in December.
Aside from the “Avatar” sequels, Disney has no 20th Century titles currently listed on its slate after 2022, only untitled placeholders. This reinforces how Disney acquired Fox not for its future but for its past, using its catalog to bolster Disney+’s offerings. And many of the 20th Century projects in development for 2022 have been steered to Hulu or Disney+, including “Ice Age: The Adventures of Buck Wild,” an animated “Night at the Museum” film and the “Predator” prequel “Prey.”
TheWrap’s 2021 Studio Box Office Report Cards
Monday: How Warner Bros.’ HBO Max Experiment Led to Mixed Box Office Results
Tuesday:Universal Mined Sequels and Flexibility on Streaming to Survive at 2021 Box Office
Wednesday: Inside Paramount’s Quiet Place at the Box Office, Sidelined for a Brighter 2022
Thursday: Sony Struck Box Office Gold With Spider-Man in 2021 – But Not Much Else
Friday: Inside Disney’s Wild 2021 Box Office: Hybrid Releases, New Marvel Heroes and ScarJo Feud
