Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos renewed and deepened his commitment to theatrical windows if the global streaming giant’s $82.7 billion deal for Warner Bros. Discovery‘s Warner Bros. studios and streaming businesses goes through.
“Our intentions when we buy Warner Bros. will be to continue to release Warner Bros. studio movies in theaters with the traditional windows,” he said during a surprise appearance at a Tuesday night event in Paris, organized by Canal+ Group to shine a spotlight on Canal+ and its StudioCanal studio’s 2026 content lineup. “We never got into it before because we never owned a theatrical distribution mechanism.”
Concluded Sarandos: “We were monetizing movies through our own subscription because that’s how we were growing the business the fastest.”
The comments come amid concerns among exhibitors and other industry players that any deal for Warner Bros. would be a hit to the theatrical business.
Highlighting that “we’ve only been doing original programming for 12 years,” Sarandos also emphasized: “We’ve been moving very fast, building a library as fast as we can. We have made everything we have greenlit, so it’s not a very deep development pool. Our library only extends back a decade, whereas Warner Bros. stretches back a hundred years. They know a lot about things we haven’t ever done, like theatrical distribution.”
Sarandos was interviewed on stage by Canal+ Group chairman and CEO Maxime Saada, who asked if Netflix would continue its relationship with Canal+ after a Warner deal. The streamer’s co-CEO said Netflix would compete for event programming and specialized sports, such as big boxing matches, concluding: “Our primary mission is film and television.”
Saada also thanked Netflix for convincing French audiences to pay for content. “Before you showed up, we had approximately 30 percent of French people willing to pay [for] TV,” he said. “Netflix showed up in France with your proposition and user experience, and you convinced the French to pay, and now the penetration of paid television is 75 percent.”
Tuesday night’s event also featured StudioCanal CEO Anna Marsh emphasizing the company’s commitment to theatrical windows and unveiling a new film project, Elsinore, starring Andrew Scott and Olivia Colman.
Read the full article here
