Disney and Victoria Alonso Settle Dispute Over Her Marvel Exit
Former top Marvel Studios executive Victoria Alonso has resolved her dispute with Disney over her sudden exit from the company in a multimillion dollar settlement, Variety has confirmed.
The news comes a month after Alonso was fired from Marvel after 17 years at the company, most recently as president of physical production, post-production, VFX and animation.
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In the days following the news of Alonso’s departure from Marvel, the reasons for it became a point of major contention. Sources at Disney asserted it was due to Alonso producing and then promoting the Oscar nominated film “Argentina, 1985,” which was made for rival Amazon Studios, in violation of an employment agreement she signed in 2022.
Alonso’s attorney Patty Glaser called that claim “absolutely ridiculous” and alleged that Alonso had been “silenced” and then “terminated when she refused to do something she believed was reprehensible.” Sources subsequently told Variety that the action involved removing an overtly LGBTQ image from “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” the kind territories hostile to LGBTQ rights regularly strike down.
In response to Glaser’s statement, a Disney spokesperson said it was “unfortunate” that Alonso was “sharing a narrative that leaves out several key factors concerning her departure, including an indisputable breach of contract and a direct violation of company policy.”
“We will continue to wish her the best for the future and thank her for her numerous contributions to the studio,” the statement concluded.
During her tenure at Marvel, Alonso became the company’s most high profile executive under studio chief Kevin Feige, as she frequently advocated for broader representation within superhero storytelling. In 2022, she came under fire in the wake of several stories about Marvel’s treatment of visual effects artists on its films and TV shows, which alleged that Marvel imposed intolerable workload demands and impossible to make deadlines. That drumbeat culminated with the release of “Quantumania,” which was roundly criticized for substandard visual effects; the film has earned $474 million globally to date, and will likely lose money in its theatrical run.
Spokespeople for Disney and Alonso did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Deadline first reported the news.
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