Hollywood will look back on 2023 as a harsh summer and a strange kind of dead reckoning. This is due to the negative news that has accumulated, which highlights a restructuring of the entertainment sector that has fostered anxiety and sparked outbreaks of labour discontent.
First occurring since Ronald Reagan was president of the Screen Actors Guild in 1960, the twin strikes by the guilds representing writers and actors demonstrate how the technological shift towards streaming, which dilutes traditional television, has shaken up business models and the employees who depend on them.
Along with the residual impacts of the Covid epidemic, customers have become more accustomed to watching films at home, which has led to significant box office disappointments.
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The flamboyant losses for studios this summer have included “The Flash” (distributed by Warner Bros., like CNN, a division of Warner Bros. Discovery), “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” from Disney, and the Pixar film “Elemental.” The judgement is yet out on how many people will accept an invitation to see “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning, Part One” on huge screens, but even Tom Cruise, who reportedly saved the theatre industry with the smash success of “Top Gun: Maverick,” might not be immune.
As Variety noted, the upfront marketplace, during which networks acquire billions of dollars in advertising contracts, has been unimpressive, contributing to the ongoing woes of linear broadcast and cable networks. The disruptions can also be observed in television.
Even ESPN, the sports juggernaut, has drastically reduced its pool of on-air talent as more consumers choose for a la carte alternatives instead of cable or satellite subscriptions.
All of these elements, along with the uncertainty they entail, help to explain why both sides seem so firmly committed, seeing the importance of the issues at stake as justification for making immediate and possibly longer-term sacrifices. Actor-director-producer George Clooney called this “an inflection point” for the business.
Since projects are created months in advance, customers won’t immediately notice the wider effects of these strikes. Other unknowns in this equation are people’s willingness to spend more for entertainment, wherever and however they consume it, as well as their changing habits and the hunger for new technologies, like Apple’s costly virtual-reality gear.
Take that into account when determining whether this reckoning will start to close the book on Hollywood’s miserable summer or will instead only foreshadow frigid winters to come.
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