The Walt Disney Company responded to financial investor Nelson Peltz slamming Marvel and Marvel Studios for going woke.
Mickey Mouse in The Prince and the Pauper (1990), Walt Disney Animation
In an interview with Financial Times, Peltz was asked if Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige should no longer be heading the studio. He answered, “I’m not ready to say that, but I question his record.”
Later in the interview, Peltz made it clear what he questions about Feige’s record, “People go to watch a movie or a show to be entertained. They don’t go to get a message.”
He asked, “Why do I have to have a Marvel that’s all women? Not that I have anything against women, but why do I have to do that? Why can’t I have Marvels that are both? Why do I need an all-Black cast?”
Nelson Peltz via CNBC Television YouTube
READ: Nelson Peltz Slams Disney For Being Woke: “Why Do I Have To Have A Marvel That’s All Women?”
Peltz’s criticisms are not unheard of. Kevin Feige made them in an interview with Jason Squire on his The Movie Business Podcast back in January 2023. Feige said, “And I guess to distill it down of what lessons are learned: is to entertain the audience at every turn.”
Feige elaborated, “Frank Capra has a quote that our co-president Louis D’Esposito quotes often, which is — basically to distill down to: entertain first. You can have as many beautiful messages, and beautiful life theories, and beautiful thematics that you want to put into the world that all of us do, and all of our filmmakers do, but if you’re not entertaining first it will fall on deaf ears.”
“I think that’s always been the way,” Feige added. “Thankfully, you’re making the kind of movies that you love to see that also goes into entertaining yourself, which is what we also try to do here at Marvel Studios.”
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – JUNE 23: (L-R) Kevin Feige, President of Marvel Studios and Alan Bergman, Chairman of Disney Studios Content attend the Thor: Love and Thunder World Premiere at the El Capitan Theatre in [Hollywood], California on June 23, 2022. (Photo by Charley Gallay/Getty Images for Disney)
Iger answered, “Let me start about content and your comment about ‘woke’ characters. Our primary objective in creating content as a company — save for ABC News, which is obviously to inform — is to entertain whether it’s sports, whether it’s Disney, whether it’s Marvel. Make things that entertain people. And the good news is that there’s a marketplace out there that demands entertainment. It’s a fantastic business to be in because of that.”
“I think what had happened over a period of time and was building and building and maybe it reached a peak of some sort while I was gone, is that creators lost sight of what their number one objective needed to be,” Iger said. “Often when we entertain and we’ve entertained as a company over the 100 years we’ve been in business, we have entertained with values and with having a positive impact on the world in many different ways. I use Black Panther as a great example of that, just in terms of fostering acceptance, or the movie Coco, which Pixar did about the Day of the Dead. I like being able to do that: entertain and if you can infuse it with positive messages that have a good impact on the world, fantastic. But that should not be the objective.”
HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA – APRIL 27: (L-R) The Walt Disney Company Chief Executive Officer Bob Iger and Bradley Cooper attend the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 World Premiere at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, California on April 27, 2023. (Photo by Charley Gallay/Getty Images for Disney)
“When I came back what I have really tried to do is to return to our roots, which is, remember, we have to entertain first,” Iger said. “It’s not about messages. Again, if your story can have a positive impact, so there’s that, and I’ve worked hard since I’ve been back in reminding the creative community that are our partners, okay so our employees, that that’s the objective.”
“And I don’t really want to tolerate the opposite, so there’s that,” he stated.
(L-R): Jonathan Majors as Kang The Conqueror in Marvel Studios’ ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA. Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios. © 2022 MARVEL.
Despite both Feige and Iger issuing very similar criticism to Peltz, a spokesman for The Walt Disney Company initially responded to Peltz’s comments telling Reuters, “This is exactly why Nelson Peltz shouldn’t be anywhere near a creatively driven company.”
The company has since responded with a power point presentation claiming Peltz’s comments demonstrate “again how ill-equipped he is to serve on Disney’s Board.”
Disney’s response to Nelson Peltz’s criticism of Marvel
Specifically, referring to Peltz’s comments about Marvel having an all-women film, the studio shared global box office revenue for Captain Marvel and The Marvels. Interestingly, it does not mention return on investment or the fact that The Marvels grossed less than $200 million and likely lost the company hundreds of millions of dollars.
As for his comments about an all-black cast, they shared the global box office for Black Panther and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. It does not note that Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’s box office declined by 36% compared to the first film or that it’s video sales declined by over 91%.
Letitia Wright as Shuri in Marvel Studios’ Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios. © 2022 MARVEL.
Ironically, Disney then posits, “Imagine the damage Peltz would do in Disney’s boardroom with these perspectives.” The company then states, “Peltz, including his silent partner Ike Perlmutter, would harm Disney and jeopardize our strategic transformation. Peltz brings no additive skills to the Board, doesn’t understand our business and has no plan to create shareholder value. One of Peltz’s ideas is to establish a bureaucratic ‘Board-led review of creative processes and structure’ … the surest way to impede our creative progress is oversight from an 81-year-old hedge fund manager with no creative experience.”
Finally, they state, “Kevin Feige has unparalleled track record at Marvel, generating ~$30bn in global box office, making him the highest grossing producer of all-time.”
However, his track record over the last five years has not been so great. In 2023 alone he produced both The Marvels and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. Both films lost money. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, which also debuted in 2023, was the worst performing Guardians of the Galaxy film and just barely made a profit. As noted above, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever saw a decline of over 36% in its box office haul compared to the first one.
Similarly, Thor: Love and Thunder performed worse than both Thor: Ragnarok and Thor: The Dark World, when factoring for inflation. It did best the first Thor film.
(L-R): Natalie Portman as Mighty Thor and Chris Hemsworth as Thor in Marvel Studios’ THOR: LOVE AND THUNDER. Photo by Jasin Boland. ©Marvel Studios 2022. All Rights Reserved.
Outside of the films, Feige’s track record on Disney+ has been spotty at best. The most recent release Echo had the same amount of minutes viewed for all five of its episodes on both Hulu and Disney+ that the debut episode of Loki did on just Disney+ alone.
The second season of Loki also performed much worse than the first season. The season one debut brought in 731 million minutes. The season 2 debut only brought in 446 million minutes.
So, while Feige had a strong record, in recent years it does not look good.
Sophia Di Martino as Sylvie in Marvel Studios’ LOKI, Season 2, exclusively on Disney+. Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios. © 2023 MARVEL.
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