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Bob Iger and top execs stressed a commitment to quality over quantity as the studio’s film slate has had a bumpy ride, talked up parks and ESPN and looked at the future of its television business at an anticipated all-hands-on-deck town hall today, one year after the Disney CEO returned to the helm.
“I spent the year with the team fixing a lot of things,” Iger said. “But I feel that we’ve just emerged from a period of a lot of fixing to one of building again and I can tell you building is a lot more fun than fixing.”
“in assessing some of our performance, recently, one of the reasons I believe it’s fallen off a bit is that we were making too much,” Iger said. “I think when it comes to creativity, quality is critical, of course, and quantity in many ways can destroy quality. Storytelling, obviously, is the core of what we do as a company.”
No news on strategic partners for ESPN, but the sports juggernaut is still on track for a 2025 streaming launch, according to town hall attendees. Parks are a bright spot and were front and center.
Appearing on stage for a roughly hour town hall at New York City’s New Amsterdam theater, Iger, alongside ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro, Disney Theme Parks President Josh Damaro, and Disney Entertainment co-Chairs Dana Walden and Alan Bergman, continued to emphasize a similar narrative from the latest earnings earlier this month.
It was all “grounds to be optimistic” is how one Disney attendee characterized the town hall.
“I knew that there were myriad challenges that I would face coming back,” Iger said. “I won’t say that it was easy, but I’ve never second guessed the decision to come back, and being back still feels great.”
“I talk about optimism being an extraordinarily important trait of a leader, because no one wants to follow a pessimist. But I also believe that hopeless optimism doesn’t do anybody any good. I have, I think, real reason—and we have real reason as Disney—to be optimists, and it starts with the fact that we’re Disney. And Disney, as you know, is a brand unto itself, but it’s also an umbrella company that houses many assets and many great brands. So, reason to be optimistic No. 1 is that.”
Pitaro reiterated plans for ESPN hitting its 2025 goal to be direct-to-consumer. “We are in market right now doing research. We’re looking at things like timing, things like price point,” he said. “Our mission is to serve the sports fan anytime, anywhere. So, if you want to continue to access ESPN in the traditional way through cable or satellite, you’ll be able to do that even once we take it over the top…but if you do want to buy it directly without subscribing to a cable or satellite package, you’ll be able to do that. And so, we are looking at things like pricing, things like timing, and we’re also looking at product enhancements.”
Meanwhile, Walden emphasized how the combined Hulu and Disney+ one-app experience will be in beta testing later this month, with plans for a full rollout in March.
Pom poms were waved on theme park side with Damaro emphasizing the $60 billion investment on the experiences side, while underscoring how the parks have rebounded greatly coming out of the pandemic in regards to attendance. The new Frozenland at Hong Kong Disneyland is considered to be success, evidence of how Disney still has the touch when it comes to brining magical experiences to life.
“We stood up on the stage just several weeks back in front of an investor community and said we are going to invest $60 billion in the next 10 years into this business because we believe in it,” he said. “We’ve seen what it’s done. We see the impact that it has on our guests and fans around the world. We’ve got so much space to play with. Disneyland for example, Walt’s original theme park, we still have enough room to build another Disneyland there if we choose to do that. So many stories to continue to tell, so many new places to go. So, we’re, we’ve come a long way in the last few years but incredibly excited about the future,” said D’Amaro.
Bergman emphasized much of the same message that Iger stressed on the earnings call how the studio’s mission in a year of misfires such as Wish, The Marvels, and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny will be one of quality over quantity. Great storytelling is the be all and end-all to success, and when it works sends out a positive ripple effect into the theme parks and consumer products. Essentially after the down box office year, Bergman spoke about how it was essential to learn from the company’s shortcomings and move ahead. He expressed excitement for near year’s slate which includes The Omen prequel, a new Planet of the Apes, Inside Out 2, a new Alien and Deadpool 3, which recently resumed filming post actors’ strike.
“We’re really excited that we were able to come to deals with our partners,” he said.
“We obviously want to build our studio back to making not only great films consistently but [to] our preeminent status in the business,” noted Iger.
David Muir of ABC News moderated the session.
Disney’s anticipated all-hands meeting comes as the company faces a multitude of challenges that have grown and morphed in the year since Iger’s sudden, surprise return as chief executive. Things were tough then as well but Iger’s presence reassured investors and employees. The big news then was no merger with Apple and no new acquisitions. All true so far, save for the upcoming multi-billion dollar purchase of Comcast’s stake in Hulu.
Iger did get down to work, unwinding an unpopular corporate structure devised by (his anointed) predecessor Bob Chapek, and would go on to cut 7,000 jobs. He recently split ESPN off into its own division. He jolted the media world earlier this year when he indicated he’d be open to alternatives for ABC and Disney’s cable networks and stations as linear television continues to decline.
Speaking with Muir, Iger shared how much he loves ABC News and everything the ABC News team does.
Walden spoke about how Hulu and ABC audiences are complimentary and not duplicative and how meaningful it is to be able to meet audiences where they are. She noted that the median age of broadcast viewer is 60+ while on Hulu/streaming, it’s 30+, so when you combine that, you can reach a massive audience of different ages.
The example she gave was ABC’s breakout new reality hit The Golden Bachelor, which has been attracting large viewership on both the broadcast network and on Hulu. “It launches on ABC, and then goes straight to Hulu hours later,” she said, “still reaching almost 15 million viewers, but meeting our viewers where they are.”
Both Iger and Walden talked about the One App experience launching in March and how great it’s going to be for Disney’s general entertainment titles to be on the app alongside its branded content.
Muir joked that The Golden Bachelor and The Bear would be able to reside next to World News Tonight. The Golden Bachelor was a running theme, providing levity to the proceedings, with audience members trying hard to get the scoop on who had won Gerry’s heart but they were asked to tune in on Thursday.
Iger said the company’s priorities are continuing to build out theme parks, turning ESPN into “the preeminent digital sports platform” and “ultimately bringing ESPN direct to consumers instead of just through cable and satellite.”
“We’ve been in the streaming business now for just four years and we accomplished a tremendous amount there. I’d like to build that streaming business into something even more significant than it is.”
More to come…
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