A friend and beloved former colleague started a conversation about Netflix’s non-US theatrical strategy over on LinkedIn. (In a nutshell, the question is: “Think it’s worth going theatrical in other territories?”) I thought I’d bring that conversation over here as well. Curious to hear what this group thinks.
My take is this: There aren't all that many international territories where theatrical is a meaningful percentage of WW box office - 5-10 depending on how you think about it. Therefore, I think it'd be worth adding theatrical to their strategies in those territories once they approach some high percentage of potential subscribers there. But it probably wouldn't be cost effective or worth the added complexity in the rest of the world.
In other words, once the advantage of streaming-only diminishes in terms of its impact on subscriber growth, if adding a theatrical window could drive a significant amount of revenue, it makes sense to do so, obviously. Not doing so might have some other advantages (lower complexity, no incremental costs associated with marketing and distribution), but some of those movies will be worth putting in movie theaters.
My take is this: There aren't all that many international territories where theatrical is a meaningful percentage of WW box office - 5-10 depending on how you think about it. Therefore, I think it'd be worth adding theatrical to their strategies in those territories once they approach some high percentage of potential subscribers there. But it probably wouldn't be cost effective or worth the added complexity in the rest of the world.
In other words, once the advantage of streaming-only diminishes in terms of its impact on subscriber growth, if adding a theatrical window could drive a significant amount of revenue, it makes sense to do so, obviously. Not doing so might have some other advantages (lower complexity, no incremental costs associated with marketing and distribution), but some of those movies will be worth putting in movie theaters.
Thoughts?