Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:
Disney’s Succession, Apple’s Slate, and a Kill Switch.
Let’s go!
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Will Disney lose its magic?
The newly announced Disney CEO is Chairperson of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Josh D’Amaro. He will take his throne on March 18th.
That’s a bit of a blow for the film industry. That the mouse house, which was birthed from an animator turned entrepreneur, Walt Disney, is being handed over to the man in charge of the “experiences” division.
But take a look at the Q1 numbers from yesterday, and it’s easy to see why:
Experiences: Q1 2026 revenue, $10.0bn (record high)
$3.3bn profit
Entertainment: Q1 2026 revenue, $11.6bn
$1.1bn profit
So the experiences division with 185K employees, 12 parks, 57 hotels made 3x the profit on less revenue than the Entertainment segment with Avatar 3 and Zootopia 2.
60% of Disney's company-wide profit comes just from the Experiences division, as does 80% of the company's value. Plus, in 2023, Disney committed $60bn over a decade to expanding the cruise ships and theme parks.
Current Disney CEO Bob Iger (2005–2020, 2022–present) stated:
“[D’Amaro] has an instinctive appreciation of the Disney brand, and a deep understanding of what resonates with our audiences, paired with the rigor and attention to detail required to deliver some of our most ambitious projects.”
D’Amaro will take home $38M this year in his new CEO role ($2.5M base salary, $9.75M signing bonus, $26.2M in stock/year). He also oversees the video games segment, which could be a cash cow if executed properly.
Dana Walden, Co-Chair of Disney Entertainment, who was also vying for the CEO role, is now the President and Chief Creative Officer.
She will make $24M this year ($2.75M base salary, $5.26M signing bonus, $15.75M in stock/year).
2026 is looking to be a monumental year in Entertainment with Disney’s Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu, plus both Avengers: Doomsday and Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
At the end of the day, the parks, cruises, and experiences division would not exist without the characters and stories that fuel it. For now, Disney seems more comfortable giving their IP to an AI company than having leadership invest in the division.
For More:
NY Times profile on D’Amaro.
Disney’s deal with OpenAI’s Sora.
THE INDUSTRY TLDR
Edward Berger is attached to direct Stradivarius at Netflix.
Netflix won Kill Switch, an action-thriller starring Jake Gyllenhaal.
Ildy Modrovich will showrun/write/EP a TV adaptation of Dear Debbie.
Tracie Laymon will write/direct Mattel’s live-action Tony the Tattooed Man.
Amazon’s Summer on the Bluffs series adds Norman Vance Jr. as showrunner.
Fubo posts $1.68bn revenue and 6.2M subs.
Range Media Partners names Jacqueline Sacerio President of Scripted TV.
Universal Music Group and CNN tap Fred Armisen to host a series.
David Letterman will EP a doc on Paul Shaffer.
Benedict Cumberbatch is set to star/produce escape thriller Last Flight.
The Last of Us season 3 adds Clea DuVall.
Knockout Shorts is producing the first-ever microdrama with an Oscar nominee.
Daniela Ruah will make her feature directorial debut with Nowhere Boy.
Netflix unveils its 2026 India slate, including Hansal Mehta’s Family Business.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
Director Edward Berger loves a fight. He’s attached to direct a new feature at Netflix called Stradivarius, where dueling violin makers in the 18th-century in Italy vie to make the perfect instrument.
Stradivarius violins are considered the best in the world, with only 650 surviving, selling for millions of dollars at auction, and praised for their inimitable sound.
We can imagine Berger going to town with these warring sides. His last two Netflix projects embrace the psychology of battle, whether it’s his masterwork, All Quiet on the Western Front, which turned a battlefield drama into a requiem for the lost youth of the fighting young men. Or the mania of Ballad of a Small Player, where Colin Farrell goes on a ballistic binge of winning and losing in neon-drenched Macau casinos. We can’t wait to see what he does with Stradivarius.
The film hails from Itamar Moses (writer: Boardwalk Empire, The Affair).
Jake Gyllenhaal’s Kill Switch. Gyllenhaal is set to star in Kill Switch, an action thriller feature that Netflix just won.
No word on plot, but it’s supposed to be a mix of Collateral and Sicario. So we’re not sure if that means Gyllenhaal as a Tom Cruise/Benicio Del Toro character. Some sort of cool as ice hitman who develops a skewed morality, maybe? Seems like a good fit.
This hails from writer Harrison Query (Amazon’s Heads of State, Amazon’s upcoming Code Black, and A24’s upcoming Trigger Point). Matt Reeves (The Batman) will produce through his 6th & Idaho prod co. Gyllenhaal’s Nine Stories prod co also produces.
Tidbits:
There’s a massive pipeline of indie filmmakers moving into comic book/action figure films. It happened with Ryan Coogler, Chloe Zhao, and Daniel Destin Cretton. Now, Tracie Laymon (dir/wri: SXSW’s Bob Trevino Likes It - trailer - starring John Leguizamo) has been hired to write and direct a live-action Tony the Tattooed Man by Mattel. Laymon does a wonderful job of humanizing lonely people, and this seems like a great fit.
Amazon MGM Studios series adaptation of Summer on the Bluffs adds Norman Vance Jr. (prod. Netflix’s Forever) as showrunner. The novel follows a matriarch who invites her three granddaughters to stay at her Martha’s Vineyard estate, with each spending their summer competing over her house.
Lucifer showrunner Ildy Modrovich is attached to the TV series adaptation of Dear Debbie as showrunner, writer, and EP. From the author of The Housemaid, Freida McFadden, the novel follows a brilliant wife and mother who seeks revenge.
Mini Tidbits:
Fubo Q1 Numbers
Range’s new President
Fred Armisen’s CNN show
Netflix’s new YouTuber
David Letterman doc
All that and more here.
Renewals:
Netflix’s A Man on the Inside (for S3)
Netflix’s Finding Her Edge (for S2)
Trailers:
The trailer we’ve all been waiting for:
Apple TV’s Margo’s Got Money Troubles
Studio: A24
Cast: Elle Fanning, Nick Offerman, Greg Kinnear, Michelle Pfeiffer, Nicole Kidman
Release: Apr 15
Apple TV’s Imperfect Women (series)
Cast: Kate Mara, Kerry Washington, Elisabeth Moss
Release date: Mar 18th
Apple TV’s Lucky (series)
Cast: Anya Taylor-Joy as a burn it to the ground action star
Release: Jul 15
Apple TV’s Monarch: Legacy of Monsters (S2)
Release: Feb 27
Netflix’s Bridgerton Season 4 | Part 2
Release: Feb 26
A24’s The Drama
Cast: Zendaya and Robert Pattinson
Release: Apr 3rd
Dogwoof’s The Cycle of Love
EP: Priyanka Chopra Jonas
Dir: Oscar-winner: Orlando von Einsiedel (Best Doc Short, The White Helmets)
US release: Q3/Q4
UK release: Sept
Dhurandhar 2
Release: Mar 19
First look:
6 Apple films, with stars like Ryan Reynolds, Chris Pratt, Jonah Hill, and Cameron Diaz. All that and more here.
THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT
Not every hero wears a cape. Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Strange) is set to lead Last Flight, a high-stakes, real-world escape thriller.
From BAFTA-winning director Babak Anvari (Under The Shadow), Last Flight will follow a desperate Afghan man who must trust an American stranger (Cumberbatch) for thousands of miles in order to get his family safely out of Afghanistan. The film is inspired by the true story of Kirk Wallace Johnson, a former US International Development Agent, with Cumberbatch navigating various levels of power and powerlessness much like his role in The Power of the Dog (2021).
Cumberbatch is also producing via his Sunny March (We Live in Time) banner, with filming set to start this May in the UK, Morocco, and Jordan. Last Flight is set to be pitched to buyers at the upcoming EFM.
Tidbits:
Ray Romano loves family drama. The Everybody Loves Raymond actor is joining the HBO Max pilot How to Survive Without Me from Greg Berlanti and Warner Bros. TV. Romano will play a grieving father forced to lead his family through grief after losing their lifeline, his wife. The show seems reminiscent of Romano’s long-running NBC family dramedy Parenthood, in which he joined as Lauren Graham’s love interest. His last TV venture was the Netflix comedic mystery series No Good Deed (2024, trailer) alongside another ensemble cast.
Mini Tidbits:
German-born actress Christa Lang (Jean-Luc Godard’s Alphaville) and husband, director Samuel Fuller (White Dog), have passed away at 82. Her work will live on in the numerous French New Wave films she starred in.
The third season of HBO’s The Last of Us announces Clea DuVall (Veep) and Jorge Lendeborg Jr. (Spider-Man: No Way Home) have joined the cast. Lendeborg will play Manny, replacing Danny Ramirez, who couldn’t return due to scheduling reasons. TLOU season 3 will premiere sometime in 2027.
NBC’s Law & Order: SVU casts Dexter actor David Zayas in a guest role spot previously held by Timothy Busfield. Reshoots are ongoing, with the scheduled episode dropping Feb. 26th.
FESTIVALS
Sales pickups:
Berlin:
Bucks Harbor
Int. Sales Rep: Indox (Sundance’s Jaripeo)
Dir: Pete Muller (debut)
Premiere: Berlin (Panorama section)
Synopsis:
In coastal Maine, harsh winters, fishing traditions, and strict paternal values mold young men. Bucks Harbor shows life where physical strength determines a man’s value.
EFM:
Butchers (Matarifes)
Int. Sales Rep: Picture Tree International (Mammal)
Dir(s): Rafael and Bernardo Antonaccio (In The Quarry)
Synopsis:
Set against the backdrop of the 1970s meat ban in Uruguay, during which José, a Galician immigrant, and his daughter Rosita establish a clandestine slaughterhouse to survive.
Kokurojo: The Samurai and the Prisoner
Int. Sales Rep: Charades (Wolf Children)
Dir: Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Wife of a Spy)
Prod. Com: Shochiku (Hara-kiri)
Synopsis:
Set in 16th century Japan, follows Lord Murashige Araki who, besieged in his castle, confronts mysterious crimes and allies with imprisoned strategist Kanbei Kuroda to uncover the truth.
L’Incident
Int. Sales Rep: Be For Films (Love Me Tender)
Dir: Victoria Musiedlak (Maman)
Cast Alba Rohrwacher (Maria), Tahar Rahim (The Mauritanian)
Festival trailers at Berlin and Rotterdam, including The Fabulous Time Machine. Check them out here.
INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT
Microdramas are getting a massive amount of buzz, because their overall numbers are massive:
$3-11bn in projected 2026 revenue
250M monthly active users
Generate $54-$86/month per platform per customer (vs. Netflix’s $7.99-$24.99)
50%+ of the audience is 18-34
Investors/players in space include:
Fox ($22M investment)
Lloyd Braun (former: Chairman of ABC)
Bill Block (former: CEO Miramax)
TelevisaUnivision
LA ($5M subsidy for Microdrama Productions)
But the downside of microdramas has always been that the acting is pretty bad.
Enter Knockout Shorts, founded by Chris Crema and Matthew Ko, which is making the first SAG-AFTRA microdrama with an Academy Award-nominated actor.
SAG-AFTRA National Executive Director & Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland shared:
“As one of the first studios to produce a SAG-AFTRA microdrama, they’re proving that new formats can deliver top-tier creative work while upholding strong labor standards.”
We’ll be interested if this is able to attract some of the larger studios/streamer players who have been allergic to microdramas, which are a tad reminiscent of the failed Quibi.
Mini Tidbit:
NCIS Los Angeles actress Daniela Ruah is making her directorial debut with Nowhere Boy (Not the 2009 movie). The film is an adaptation of a YA coming-of-age novel that follows an orphaned Syrian boy who makes a new American friend. The film is being produced by book-to-movie expert Matthew Baer (Unbroken).
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
Netflix has unveiled its 2026 India slate, showing a major escalation in scale and star power.
One standout is the Hansal Mehta (writer: TIFF’s Shahid) directed Family Business (first look teaser), a Succession-esque drama series centered on a corporate power struggle exposing and challenging family dynamics. Starring Anil Kapoor (Slumdog Millionaire) and Vijay Varma (Gully Boy).
Another intriguing project is the original courtroom drama feature IKKA, led by the record-breaking Dhurandhar’s Akshaye Khanna and Bollywood action star Sunny Deol (Gadar).
2026 marks ten years of Netflix in India. See all the upcoming titles here.
Mini Tidbits:
Dom Bird, SVP of International Unscripted TV at MGM TV, is exiting because…
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