The entrainment world watched as actress Scarlett Johansson went toe to toe with arguably the industry's most powerful motion picture entity. Displeased with the release of Marvel Studio's Black Widow Disney's Plus Premier Access platform and the way in which it would affect her bonus payment, the starlet filed a lawsuit against the Walt Disney Pictures.
While the two parties may have recently reached a settlement, it seems like the mega movie-making company may not be out of the woods just yet. Following Johansson's lawsuit, another player may be entering the courtroom with similar grudges. There's a possibility that Emma Stone could file a lawsuit against the company for the way that Cruella was released to Disney+ along with its theatrical debut.
Johansson and her team found unfair Black Widows hybrid release unfair, seeing as how uploading it to a streaming platform along with its theatrical debut would cajole some audiences to not purchase movie tickets. Accompanying its theatrical debut, Black Widow was released on Disney+ for the price of $30. This negatively affects the actress' pay. Her salary was supposedly acclimated from the film's theatrical performance. For example, while Ariana Greenblatt was getting paid $10 thousand per day on the set of Boss Baby 2, she was slated to receive up to $1,075,000 depending on how well the movie did at the box office. Prematurely, putting movies on streaming services stunts this bonus.
In light of Cruella facing the same hybrid release, reports came in that Stone was 'weighing her options' in regards to taking similar legal action. In contrast, it was also reported that Emily Blunt, who faces the same problem as Jungle Cruise, was also released on Disney+, was keeping an eye on the film's opening weekend performance before making a decision.
While Stone and her team have yet to disclose whether or not a lawsuit will come, Johansson's settlement stands as a glimmer of hope for performers who may find themselves in the same predicament.
Though she wasn't the only actor who stood up to a big production company in court this year, days after Johannson filed her lawsuit, Gerald Bulter slapped Nu Image/Millennium Films with a $10 million lawsuit for, according to his lawyers, refusal "to pay Butler a penny of the grosses and profits promised to him in the parties' agreement," from the box office performance of Olympus Has Fallen.
If this sort of business continues in Hollywood, we may just see an actor's strike on our hands!
Sources: New York Times, Yahoo! News NBC News
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