The Russo Brothers are spending this COVID-19 pandemic lockdown finishing up work on their “Avengers: Endgame” follow-up film, the crime thriller, “Cherry.” and though they seem to be mere months away from wrapping up work on the film, the directors still don’t know how audiences will be able to watch it.
Speaking to Deadline, Joe and Anthony Russo opened up about their uncertainty about when/where film fans will be able to watch “Cherry.” Will it be on VOD? Streaming? Or maybe theaters? The pandemic has really thrown a wrench in their plans.
“It is clearly a shifting market and we have had a great experience with SVOD,” Russo said. “Everyone is going to have to take a moment see what the world is going to hold for the next few years, and make decisions based on what are the best ways to get audiences to see stories. [On ‘Cherry’] we’ll just base our decision on that. It doesn’t mean we’ve made a decision.”
Anthony Russo added, “Our plan for that movie was always to finish it and then show it and figure out the best course of action. We’re still a couple months away from that and we’ll evaluate what to do with ‘Cherry’ in July.”
READ MORE: Joe Russo Says Tom Holland’s ‘Cherry’ Performance Is “Oscar-Worthy”
What the Russo Brothers are teasing is an option that many studios have been mulling over for their films over the past month or two. Do you wait until theaters are back to “normal” and release a film, hoping that it’ll recoup the costs and make a profit? Or do you sell the distribution rights to a streaming service or release the film straight to VOD to help break-even and hopefully get people to see the film that way? It’s a question that has led to Universal releasing films such as “Trolls World Tour” and “The King of Staten Island” straight to VOD, while Disney has decided to release “Artemis Fowl” on its own streaming service, free for subscribers.
“The focus of AGBO was always storytelling that is agnostic in its approach to distribution,” said Joe Russo. “We’ve felt for a long time there was going to be a change in distribution and that the more flexible and organic AGBO could behave, the more opportunity would present itself for storytelling. The theory we have been operating under has been effective for us.”
An added layer to think of with “Cherry” is awards consideration. While many people don’t take Joe Russo’s words about Oscar predictions very seriously after he mentioned Robert Downey, Jr. as someone who should have earned a nomination for “Avengers: Endgame,” the director has already gone on record saying that Tom Holland is turning in an “oscar-worthy” performance in “Cherry.” If the film goes straight to VOD or streaming, it could be difficult to make that case.
Regardless, it doesn’t appear that “Cherry” will be arriving on any platform anytime soon, so we have time to wait and see.