Michael Shamberg On How The Theatrical Business Can Rebound From Covid-19 – Guest Column

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Editors’ Note: Michael Shamberg is a tenured film and TV producer whose credits include Contagion, Get Shorty, The Big Chill, Erin Brockovich, Out of Sight, Pulp Fiction, A Fish Called Wanda and many others.With the Warner Bros announcement that all its 2021 films will premiere online at the same time as in theaters, it’s likely moviegoing is changed forever.

The industry leader Disney, which has 40% of the U.S. box office, now calls movies in theaters a “legacy” medium, which really means before Netflix came along.

But the tradition of “cinema” as an art form won’t survive if it isn’t updated to speak to the 140 million millennials and Gen Zers who are growing up watching movies on their cell phones, laptops and big-screen TVs.I was one of