John Carter and the Gods of Hollywood
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324 Disney Staff, “John Carter (2012),” John Carter Facebook Page, 28 Nov 2010, 7 Sep 2012
325 El Capitan is a single screen, 800 seat classic theater that is company owned by Disney and is used by Disney for premieres and special events. Its schedule is locked in advance and so it was established prior to the start of the John Carter run that John Carter’s run would end on April 19th to make way on April 20th for Disney Nature’s “Chimp.”
326 Michael D. Sellers, “Last Trip to Barsoom: Join us For Closing Night of the John Carter run at El Capitan in Hollywood,” The John Carter Files, 12 Apr 2012, 7 Sep 2012
327 Daria Brooks, “Enjoying John Carter’s Second Run,” The John Carter Files, Sep 15, 2012, Jan 21, 2013
328 Michael D. Sellers, “How Fans Describe Their First Encounter with Barsoom,” The John Carter Files, 19 Jul 2012 4 Nov 2012
329 Ross would not have been responsible for formulating the specific response or change in course, but he would have been the one responsible for insisting that a change in approach be pursued -- something that did not happen.
330 Of all the participants, MT Carney most clearly “dropped the ball,” but one unknown is -- what sort of guidance was she getting from Rich Ross. Although the precise details of Ross’s guidance are not known, it seems reasonable to assume that if Ross had conveyed to Carney a sense of urgency commensurate with ‘Carter’s budget, surely she would have at least been able to respond with a higher level of output, even if the creatives didn’t improve. It seems unlikely that she ever got that kind of push from Ross.
331 Just Disney Staff, “Walt Disney General Quotes,” JustDisney.com, 4 Nov 2012
332 Carol Massar, “Iger: I Was Worried About John Carter,”Bloomberg News, 11 May 2012, 11 Sep 2012
333 Michael D. Sellers, “John Carter Producer Jim Morris at the ERB Centennial Celebration,” The John Carter Files 18 Aug 2012, 11 Sep 2012
334 Brooks Barnes, “Is Disney’s Chief Having a Cinderella Moment,” New York Times, 10 Apr 2010, 4 Nov 2012
335 In a focus group study in which 12-17 year old teenagers hooked on current book series including The Hunger Games, Twilight, and the Harry Potter book series were given the opportunity to read A Princess of Mars, the results were overwhelmingly positive. See Michael D. Sellers, “Teen Readers React to A Princess of Mars,” The John Carter Files, 13 May 2012 15 Nov 2012
336 In Motion Picture accounting, the one-time costs for a one-off film are typically adjusted after the fact when sequels are ordered and amortized over the full series. Thus under the normal scenario, sequels would each bear a small, proportionate share of the one-time costs that are currently carried by John Carter. However, since Disney has already taken an extreme $200M write-down and written these costs off, the “normal” procedure would not automatically apply.
337 Traditionally in Hollywood, the shorthand way of determining whether a film is a success or not is “if global box office equals twice production costs, the film will be profitable.” This does NOT mean that profitability is achieved from the theatrical results only. Rather, it means that if a film doubles its budget at the box office, then by the time all revenue streams are in, the net to the studio will be enough to generate a profit after the production investment and marketing costs are recouped. Thus a “floor” of $350M global box office against $175M production cost equals ultimate “profitability” for a film.
338 Motion Picture Association of America, “Theatrical Market Statistics 2011,” Available as PDF Download, Accessed 7 Sep 2012
339 Matthew Garrahan, “Film Studios Strike Rich Treasure in Russia,” Financial Times/FT.com, 12 May 2011, 7 Sep 2012,
340 Jonathan Landreth, “Disney, DMG team up to make ‘Iron Man 3’ a Chinese Co-production,” LA Times, 16 Apr 2012, 7 Sep 2012
341 Richard Verrier, “DreamWorks Animation’s ‘Kung Fu Panda 3’ to be China Co-production,” LA Times, 16 Aug 2012, 7 Sep 2012