Last month, filmmaker Emerald Fennell, her star/producer Margot Robbie, and backer MRC surprised many in the industry by passing on a $150M offer from Netflix to acquire their upcoming “Wuthering Heights,” and instead opting to take Warner Bros.’ significantly lower bid.
Fennell and Robbie were adamant in giving “Wuthering Heights” a robust theatrical rollout — it’s been reported that they left close to $80M on the table by refusing the Netflix offer. It turns out that the whole ordeal left Netflix totally bewildered by what had just occurred.
A report from Variety has a top agent saying that Netflix was “shocked” by Fennell’s Netflix snub “because obviously they had outbid [every other studio] for so long,” and had been used to winning these contests.
Netflix wasn’t even the runner-up in the bidding contest to acquire ‘Wuthering.’ Amazon is believed to have barely missed out in nabbing Fennell’s film as, much like Warner Bros, they had promised Fennell a major theatrical push. Warners won out by offering $70M to distribute the film.
“Netflix has the biggest number of subscribers and scale, so they can afford to play the game that they’re playing,” says Eric Handler, an analyst at Roth Capital Partners. “But there’s a growing contingent of directors and movie stars who are saying, ‘No thanks.’”
Fennell/Robbie’s Netflix snub could turn out to be an earth shaking moment in the industry. Just look at what’s happened since the snub; Greta Gerwig has seemingly convinced Netflix to release her “Narnia” theatrically in IMAX, and Daniel Craig is now pushing hard for next year’s ‘Knives Out 3’ to get the same treatment.