There is no denying “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” were 2023’s biggest films. They raked in $1.44 billion and $951 million respectively at the box office, giving rise to the Barbenheimer phenomenon. In a recent interview, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos said the films would have been “just as big” on streaming.
This interview comes hot on the heels of film chairman Scott Stuber’s exit from the company in March. This has led to speculation that Netflix will be drastically changing its content strategy, with most assuming it will produce fewer movies to focus on higher-quality content. But Sarandos has been quick to deny this since he believes that quantity doesn’t inherently mean sacrificing quality.
The Right Content
During Sarandos’ talk with the New York Times, he was adamant in his belief that quality and quantity are not mutually exclusive and you can have both. This led to a discussion about what kind of content he feels is right or wrong for Netflix.
“I don’t think that there’s a clean answer because the best version of something may work really well for Netflix but just hasn’t worked to date,” Sarandos responded. “There’s some obvious ones, like we don’t do breaking news and that kind of thing, because I think there’s a lot of other outlets for it. People aren’t looking to us for that.”
“Barbie” and “Oppenheimer”
Then the interviewer brought up the success of “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer,” both of which received traditional theatrical releases.
“Both of those movies would be great for Netflix,” said Sarandos “They definitely would have enjoyed just as big an audience on Netflix. And so I don’t think there’s any reason to believe that certain kinds of movies do or don’t work. There’s no reason to believe that the movie itself is better in any size of screen for all people. My son’s an editor. He is 28 years old, and he watched “Lawrence of Arabia” on his phone.”
