David Zaslav, the head of the Warner Bros. Discovery media empire, tore into movie executives at Warner who green-lit a Clint Eastwood film even though they knew the movie would likely fail to turn a profit at the box office, according to a report.
Days after Warner Bros. and Discovery completed a merger in early April, Zaslav met with Warner Bros. Pictures studio heads and quizzed them about a string of flops, according to The Wall Street Journal.
One of the movies that grossed poorly at the box office last year was “Cry Macho,” a neo-Western produced and directed by the iconic “Dirty Harry” star.
“Cry Macho” grossed a little more than $15.5 million worldwide — despite a reported budget of $33 million — according to IMDB,
During the meeting, studio heads acknowledged that they doubted whether “Cry Macho” would be profitable.
Zaslav is then reported to have asked why the film was made if the executives knew it would be a flop.
The studio bosses are said to have replied to Zaslav that they felt indebted to Eastwood because of the string of hits that he had delivered over his 50-year career with the studio.
Eastwood, 91, also had a perfect record in getting films into the can on time and never going over budget, the studio honchos told their new boss.
But Zaslav was unimpressed, according to the Journal. He told his underlings that they didn’t owe favors to anyone.
Zaslav then reportedly quoted a famous line from the 1996 Tom Cruise hit film “Jerry Maguire.
“It’s not show friends, it’s show business,” Zaslav is reported to have told them.
In his first six weeks at the helm of the newly merged entity, Zaslav has not been afraid to make bold moves for the sake of belt-tightening.
He pulled the plug on the fledgling streaming service CNN+ less than a month after its launch, citing low subscriber numbers.
“Zas is not particularly patient,” Margaret Loesch, who ran Discovery Kids under Zaslav but is now retired, told the Journal.
“He is going to want to change things quickly,” she said.
Loesch added that making CNN+ go dark so quickly was “pure Zas.”
Under Zaslav, several people who held high-profile positions have departed, including former Warner Bros. General Counsel John Rogovin; Brett Weitz, the general manager of TNT, TBS, and TruTV; and Tom Ascheim, who oversaw children’s programming.
