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Chernin Entertainment Signs First-Look Deal With Netflix

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Chernin Entertainment has signed a first-look deal for feature films with Netflix.

The companies confirmed the deal on Tuesday. Chernin’s previous first-look deal had been through 20th Century Fox, but that agreement went away earlier this year after Disney absorbed the Fox feature film operations last year.

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Variety reported exclusively in January that Chernin Entertainment would retain 70 of the 80-plus movie projects that it had in development at 20th. The projects remaining at Disney — like a new “Planet of the Apes” film with director Wes Ball (“The Maze Runner”) — are based on Disney-held intellectual property, and Chernin will remain attached as an executive producer.

After Chernin stepped down as the president of Fox’s then-parent company News Corp. in 2009, he launched Chernin Entertainment as a film production company with 2011’s “Rise of the Planet of the Apes.” He also produced several other high-profile ,movies for Fox in the previous decade, including “Hidden Figures,” “The Greatest Showman” and recent best picture nominee “Ford v Ferrari.” All told, Chernin made 24 movies over eight years, almost all of them at Fox.

Disney’s $71.3 billion acquisition of 21st Century Fox changed the landscape for film production at 20th, especially after the division’s film slate in 2019 dramatically underperformed, posting a $170 million loss in Disney’s fiscal third quarter. That caused Disney to cancel the majority of then-Fox’s film development slate and refocus production on established franchises.

Chernin Entertainment’s most recent films included the Kristen Stewart thriller “Underwater,” debuted with a limp $7 million domestic opening weekend, and the animated comedy “Spies in Disguise” grossed around $170 million worldwide.

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