Disney CEO Admits Disney Plus Content Is Diluting Audiences' Focus From Its Theatrical Tentpoles

Los Angeles, July 14 - Disney CEO Bob Iger has admitted that Marvel making a number of Disney+ series is diluting the audiences' focus and attention from theatrical tentpole and this is one of the main reasons for the underwhelming box office performance of recent Marvel and Disney movies.

During a recent interview with CNBC's David Faber (via Variety), Iger cited that the studio has screwed up audiences' expectations by making so much Disney-plus content. Over the last few months, Disney has had some major setbacks regarding the theatrical outcome as films like "Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania", "Elemental" and "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny", disappoint at the box office.



"There have been some disappointments. We would have liked some of our more recent releases to perform better", Iger said. "It's reflective not as a problem from a personnel perspective, but I think in our zeal to basically grow our content significantly to serve mostly our streaming offerings, we ended up taxing our people way beyond — in terms of their time and their focus — way beyond where they had been".

He continued, "Marvel's a great example of that. They had not been in the TV business at any significant level. Not only did they increase their movie output, but they ended up making a number of television series, and frankly, it diluted focus and attention. That is, I think, more of the cause than anything".

Apart from the live-action movies, the underwhelming box office performances of Pixar's "Elemental" and "Lightyear" also came as a major shock to Disney. Pixar movies have given rich rewards to Disney over the year and Iger admits that the studio's decision to put three Pixar movies, "Soul", "Luca" and "Turning Red" on Disney+ in a row during the pandemic has created a negative impact on the audiences.

"There were three Pixar releases in a row that went direct to streaming, in part because of — mostly because of COVID. And I think that may have created an expectation in the audience that they're going to eventually be on streaming and probably quickly, and there wasn't an urgency. And then I think there was some, I think you’d have to agree that there were some creative misses, as well", he said.

Stay tuned...