Bob Iger Speaks Out On Actor’s & Writer’s Strike
Just last month, during an interview with CNBC, just one day before the actor’s strike began, Disney CEO Bob Iger, said that Hollywood’s striking unions were making demands that were “not realistic”, resulting in a huge PR nightmare for the company as Iger took all the heat for major executives at the studios.
During today’s quarterly financial call, Disney CEO Bob Iger, spoke about the strikes and put on a different tone, saying:
“Nothing is more important to this company and its relationships with the creative community. and that includes actors, writers, animators, directors and producers. I have deep respect and appreciation for all those who are vital to the extraordinary creative engine that drives this company and our industry. It is my fervent hope that we quickly find solutions to the issues that have kept us apart these past few months, and I am personally committed to working to achieve this result,”
Bob Iger isn’t the only CEO to speak out about the strikes during a quarterly investors call, as Warner Brothers Discovery, Netflix, Paramount, and Comcast have all said something similar. With both Paramount and Warner Brothers Discovery, CEOs have spoken out about how much money they’ve saved due to the strikes.
Disney did announce that they’ve drastically reduced the amount of money they are spending on their streaming services,
“We currently expect fiscal 2023 content spend to come in at approximately $27 billion, which is lower than we previously guided due to lower spend on produced content, in part due to the writers and actors strikes,”
With the writer’s strike now into its 100th day, it doesn’t seem like any movement is underway. Hopefully, the studios will start making plans to get everyone back to work.