Many scoffed when Disney announced that it would charge viewers $30 to watch Mulan at home on Disney+. Well, it sounds like that approach may have paid off.
Yahoo reports that research firm 7Park Data has determined that 29% of U.S. Disney+ subscribers paid the $30 for Mulan in its first week. 7Park broke down the numbers (there are 60 million Disney+ members worldwide and half are likely Americans) and calculated that roughly 9 million American households bought Mulan. Doing simple math, it sounds like Disney has made about $261 million from the U.S. alone.
That’s a big number, you don’t need to be a industry insider to see that. It’s an even sweeter amount when you consider that Disney isn’t splitting any of that pot with theater chains, like studios usually do when they release films. All $261 million is going straight to Disney. Mickey’s wallet just got fatter.
Obviously we don’t know just how accurate these numbers are. Disney is notoriously tight-lipped about these sorts of things. But 7Park Data is pretty confident in their findings. In fact, they feel their calculations are on the more conservative side of things, meaning Mulan might have made even more than the alleged $261 million.
This is another huge blow to the theater industry. The sum of money that Disney just brought in without screening this film in a single American theater is massive and will make them (and other studios) seriously consider releasing films on-demand for a premium price rather than sending them to scarcely-attended theaters and sharing the profit.
Obviously when you look at what Mulan has made in the U.S. alone compared to what Tenet has made in wide release, you can see why Disney is quite happy with their decision. Mulan has made more in only the U.S. than Tenet has worldwide (Tenet just broke $200 worldwide). You can’t blame Tenet for its poor showing since COVID-19 has completely turned theaters on their heads. But you also can’t blame Disney and other studios in the future for deciding to go the on-demand route after seeing these numbers.
We keep saying that COVID-19 is going to change the way people go (or don’t go) to the movies. This is more evidence of that.