The folks who run Warner Bros. Pictures are experiencing an existential moment. From Discovery’s purchase of parent company WarnerMedia to the ensuing budget cuts and the Losses reported ahead of an earnings call on Thursday, the future of the studio looks hazy. Any kind of cultural revival, according to David Zaslav, CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery, starts with franchises — and involves making many more of them.
During that conference call, Zaslav explained his plans for the company to prioritize its largest franchises:
Focus on the big movies that are loved, which are tent poles that people leave early from dinner to watch — and we’ve got plenty of those. Batman, Superman, Aquaman if we can do something with JK [Rowling] to Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, what do we do with Game of Thrones? What do we do with a lot of the big franchises that we have? We focus on franchises.
“Do something with JK” could mean that Zaslav wants Rowling removed from the show’s theatrical future, or that WB simply has ambitions to negotiate a new deal with the Harry Potter author. But as it stands, it’s a potentially troubling statement given the once-beloved author’s consistent remarks that many have viewed as transphobic. Zaslav hasn’t specified what Rowling creatively brings to the Harry Potter series other than saying that the franchise is ripe for a sequel.
Curiously, the CEO also told investors that the studio “hadn’t made a Harry Potter movie in 15 years.” That is not completely right. Technically, WB is right in the middle of a new Harry Potter franchise with the Fantastic Beasts series being written and curated by Rowling himself. But no one, not even Zaslav, seems interested in Fantastic Beasts. (Ouch?)
While the first Fantastic Beasts film – which happens to be the one least directly connected to the original Potter story of the three released so far – scored a killer at the box office, the other two struggled to amass American viewership. Grindelwald’s crimes failed to match the highs of its predecessor in 2018, and The Secrets of Dumbledore was a bombshell earlier this year, falling short of $100 million at the domestic box office. So if it makes you associate Rowling (and her constant transphobia) with the franchise, what’s the point?
The short answer is that Warner Bros. retains the rights to the Harry Potter universe along with Rowling himself. Any future Potter projects would have to go through her and her company as well as the studio. But aside from agreeing to let WB produce more films, it seems Rowling isn’t adding all that much value to this series – because at the moment it’s unclear what the “Harry Potter franchise” ultimately is. Are Zaslav and Warner Bros. hoping to bring back the original cast as adults, or recast them with older actors to tell a story about when the wizarding world is next in peril? Also, with the bombing of Fantastic Beasts and the focus back on Harry himself, it seems like WB might not be so keen on the Marauders prequel – which would follow the generation before Harry during their time at Hogwarts – which fans have been after for years have screamed.
Perhaps the best answer for Zaslav and Warner Bros. is the most obvious: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. The stage play supervised by Rowling but written by Jack Thorne (who adapted Its dark materials for WarnerMedia’s HBO), is a sequel to the original Harry Potter story and follows the children of the series’ main characters. The show has been hugely successful since its premiere in 2016, and thanks to a recent revamp from a two-day Broadway event to a one-night show, it continues to sell out wherever it plays. While a film version of the story could undercut ticket sales, a sequel to the play that takes the kids a little further into their Hogwarts experience could offer fans the perfect mix of nostalgia for old characters and a new story to immerse themselves in can deepen.
No wonder Warner Bros. wants to dig its current hole with franchises. As Zaslav himself said, the company has a lot of them and they are quite popular. house of the dragon just wrapped up a tremendous first season, the return of Henry Cavill’s Superman has the whole internet excited, and it’s hard to ignore that Amazon Studios’ biggest show of the year came from a franchise that Warner Bros. still owns the film rights to holds .
Returning to the Harry Potter fountain seems like the obvious next step for Warner Bros., and despite it all, the franchise remains one of the most popular brands in the world. But finding a way to bring this hit back to theaters won’t be easy.