Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss star in Warner Bros. “Revival of the Matrix.”
Warner Bros.
Village Roadshow Entertainment, co-producer of “The Matrix Resurrections,” filed a lawsuit against Warner Bros., alleging that the parent studio’s decision to release the sequel on HBO Max and simultaneously in theaters was a breach of contract, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.
The lawsuit, filed Monday in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleges that WarnerMedia, a unit of AT&T, pushed the movie’s release date to 2021 from 2022 to bolster its subscriber base on HBO Max.
Representatives of Warner Bros. did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
“The sole purpose of WB in moving ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ release date was to generate a wave of year-end premium HBO Max subscriptions that were much-needed from what they knew would be a blockbuster, despite knowing full well that it would destroy the film’s box office revenue and deprive Village Roadshow of any economic benefits that the WB and its affiliates would enjoy,” the lawsuit said, according to the WSJ.
Warner Bros. decided at the end of 2020 that its entire list of movies released in 2021 would hit theaters and on HBO Max on the same day. This practice was essential in the early days of the pandemic, when a vaccine wasn’t widely available and audiences were starting to return to movie theaters. By the end of 2021, however, these dual-release films had taken a significant cut of the box office.
“The Matrix Resurrections” was disappointing at the box office, partly because of its concurrent release strategy and partly because its target audience was older than those most actively returning to theaters.
Village Roadshow isn’t the first time suing a studio over its one-on-one release strategy. Last July, Scarlett Johansson filed a lawsuit Disneyaccuse her contract to star in “Black Widow” was breached when the media giant decided to release the movie on the Disney+ streaming platform at the same time it hit theaters. The two sides settled the dispute in September.
