Warner Bros. Discovery CFOon Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings Franchises: W

Posted by Aldo Pusey on Friday, September 6, 2024

Never fear, genre fans: Warner Bros. Discovery is intent on mining as much of its tentpole Warner Bros. IP as possible in the near future, whether that be through its upcoming revamped DC Universe, the newly announced “The Lord of the Rings” movies, or more projects based on J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” franchise amid the success of video game “Hogwarts Legacy.”

“DC is an enormous opportunity and two important building blocks are in place now with the leadership team, Peter [Safran] and James [Gunn], and James has been breathing comics for as long as he’s been alive, essentially,” Warner Bros. Discovery CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels said during a panel at Morgan Stanley’s investor conference Wednesday. “A great creative leader here. And the second building block that is in place is the one-company approach, because I think you can only manage a franchise if everything is coordinated and the team is working together extremely well. There’s an enormous level of collaboration and joint decision making around what should work hand in hand across the franchise.”

Popular on Variety

Related Stories

Two race cars side by side, with one car representing Netflix and the other representing YouTube VIP+

Netflix vs. YouTube: The Post-Streaming Wars Era’s Archrivalry

Jack Whitehall Dave Bautista Rebel Wilson Michael Buble

Jack Whitehall Lands Prime Video Christmas Special Featuring Dave Bautista, Rebel Wilson and Michael Bublé (EXCLUSIVE)

But DC is not the only Warner Bros.-owned world that WBD leadership is interested in capitalizing on: “Take ‘Harry Potter’ as an example, the Wizarding World, the fact that we are enjoying this massive success with the ‘Hogwarts Legacy’ launch, 12 years after the last film came out, shows that there is so much opportunity and we’re only just starting to expand that,” Wiedenfels said. “We’ve got the new ‘Harry Potter’ tour coming up in Tokyo in the middle of the year. Long story short, I think this one-company approach, great leadership in the individual business units, but coordinated franchise management is probably one of the biggest opportunities the company has.”

As for when are we going to get the new “Lord of the Rings” films, which Warner Bros. announced during its recent fourth-quarter earnings call, Wiedenfels was evasive, but hopeful.

“David made a promise, quote unquote, very early on to revitalize some of that iconic, tentpole IP and we’re starting to make progress,” the CFO said. “It’s exciting to see how people are coming in and out and how the creative community is embracing this opportunity to work with us. That’s going to bear fruit, over time.”

Read More About:

Jump to Comments

More from Variety

Most Popular

Must Read

Sign Up for Variety Newsletters

By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. // This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Variety Confidential

A Variety and iHeartRadio Podcast

ncG1vNJzZmiukae2psDYZ5qopV9nfXN%2Fjp%2BgpaVfo7K4v46hmKuqqWK9sMDTnqlmpJ%2BnsW67xWaroZ1dp7avs9Jmp6unmpqwtb%2BMsJirppWneqO%2BzqxknaGjmLy3sdGyZGpqY2qCdYOQamho

CATALOG
    FEATURED TAGS