EXCLUSIVE: Adam Aron, chief executive of AMC Entertainment, said there's more agreement around extending exclusive theatrical windows than one might think given the tensions bubbling among the exhibitor community and pretty much exploding at CinemaCon this year.
"I have at least three of the six major studios who are completely in agreement that we need to bring back the 45-day window," he told Deadline on Wednesday as the biggest annual event for theater owners and studios kicks into high gear in Vegas. "And that's a good start."
AMC is the largest theater chain in the U.S and globally.
"Now, if you look at every studio except for Disney, the window is 18 to 36 days. For Disney, the window is 60 days. Good for Disney … and Disney's been a very successful studio. So we shall see. But the largest exhibitor in the United States is in serious dialogue with studio after studio after studio [because] we as an industry are leaving money on the table by not living up to the 45-day window."
"We have started conversations with almost every major studio so far — we haven't gotten to everybody yet — that as an industry, collectively, we need to fix this, and we need to bring back at least a 45-day window, and then we can talk about, should it be more than 45 days? But it can't be 25 days. It can't be 28 days, right? It can't be 32 days, because it's robbing movie theaters, of moviegoers."
He wouldn't say which three are on board and which still need convincing. He hasn't yet spoken to all of them. "This is still fresh … I'm having dialogue with studios, one after another, after another. And so far, I'm not saying we have any no's yet, but I am saying we have three yeses." He's talking about legacy studios, not — yet — new MPA member Amazon MGM Studios, or Apple Studios. "But there are six major studios. I got three of them — not 'I', but, well, you know, our conversations with three of them — they agree with what I just said."
Asked if those three will, in fact, commit, he said, "I think so, when I get all six."
For what it's worth, Sony Motion Pictures boss Tom Rothman at the studio's presentation Monday told assembled exhibitors, to great applause that, "Cost and windows can work for us or against us. Theatrical needs to be smart about them both. I will let you know that Sony will work with you on both."
On a panel yesterday, Peter Levinsohn, Chairman, Global Distribution, NBCUniversal Entertainment & Studios, however, said the studio has and needs to fine-tune its windows to maximize profits and follow the consumer, who "is not going to go to see every single movie in the theater." So Universal may be a hard nut to crack.
Jeff Goldstein, President, Global International Distribution, Warner Bros Pictures, and Mark Viane, President, International Distribution, Paramount Pictures, skirted windows talk on an a panel here in Las Vegas on Monday, but Vue International CEO Tim Richards and Cinepolis CEO Alejandro Ramirez Magana did not, noting that box office has rebounded nicely in key international territories that have longer windows.
Eduardo Acuna, chief executive of the second largest U.S. and global exhibitor, the Regal Cineworld group, speaking on the panel with Levinsohn, seconded Aron, saying, "I think we just finally got to a place in the industry where we can have some more momentum around this 45-day window."
Aron, Acuna, theater owners on the ground in Las Vegas and Michael O'Leary, the head of their trade group Cinema United say shorter windows are an experiment born from Covid that has had its day. "Everybody signed on to [it]. It is an experiment that has failed and Hollywood collectively is training people to stay home," said Aron.
Data shows that with very short windows people "a significant chunk of population is going to stay home and wait for it to come on TV, and the movie theater industry cannot afford that loss of some percentage of moviegoers who would, who used, to go to theaters when there was a 74-day window."
"If Hollywood studios want theaters to be around for the big tentpoles that they want to release, then there's an ecosystem that needs to be supported so that there is enough revenue flowing through the theatrical system, so that the theatrical system is healthy."
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