Yesterday, AMC Theatres rejoiced as the company announced that it has secured enough funding (nearly $1 billion) to keep afloat during the pandemic and well into 2021. But that doesn’t mean the company thinks everything in the film industry is going really well right now, as more studios push films out of spring and into the second half of the year. But even still, the AMC CEO is excited about the future.
READ MORE: AMC Theatres Scores New Funding That Takes Imminent Bankruptcy “Completely Off The Table”
Speaking to Variety, AMC Theatres CEO Adam Aron is confident. Surprised? Well, maybe you shouldn’t be. With the influx of new funding and the COVID-19 vaccine getting disseminated to the general population, the executive believes that his theater chain and the film industry, in general, are in for a good summer and fall 2021.
“What that means is that as we look ahead into summer and next fall, movies will get released again and consumers will go back to movie theaters again,” he explained. “So as I look ahead, I’m quite optimistic and encouraged.”
As for the recent swath of delays from major studios, pushing blockbusters like “Morbius,” “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” and “No Time to Die” into the fall and beyond, Aron isn’t surprised and expected this might be the case.
“We expected that April and May movies would move, as they are [being moved],” Aron said. “There will be a tremendous amount of vaccination that gets completed in the United States in the winter and spring. So I think we will have a summer movie season. The second half of 2021 should be much brighter than the first half.”
READ MORE: Disney Pushes ‘The King’s Man’ To August As More Films Move Out Of The Spring
But, of course, even with the delays of studio films and the news that AMC might actually survive the pandemic, there is still discussion about the news WarnerMedia shifted its entire WB 2021 slate to HBO Max and theaters simultaneously. Even though AMC has been critical of the move when it was announced, Aron isn’t interested in talking about that at this moment.
“Our conversations with Warner Bros. are still fluid,” he explained. “We were the first major theater chain to sign on to ‘Wonder Woman 1984.’ We were the first to respond in horror to their announcement about the entire 2021 film slate. We have to have more conversations with Warner Bros. about their 2021 movies. I’m not going to talk about Warner Bros. today, nor am I particularly worried about it today. Today is a day to celebrate that we raised $917 million to deal with this pandemic, not to worry about the state of play with Warner Bros.”
As of now, there really aren’t any major films arriving in theaters before May. And we could be looking at a longer quiet time period if Disney decides to push “Black Widow” out of its early May release date. But even still, it appears that the man in charge of AMC Theatres isn’t concerned about that and is clearly looking ahead to a bright future.