Steven Spielberg Slams HBO Max For Throwing His “Filmmaker Friends” Under the Bus

Ahead of the anticipated release of The Fabelmans, Steven Spielberg shared his thoughts on direct-to-streaming releases.

In an interview with The New York Times, the famed director said, “The pandemic created an opportunity for streaming platforms to raise their subscriptions to record-breaking levels and also throw some of my best filmmaker friends under the bus as their movies were unceremoniously not given theatrical releases.”

He continued, “They were paid off and the films were suddenly relegated to, in this case, HBO Max. The case I’m talking about. And then everything started to change.”

Spielberg is referring to an incident that occurred in 2020 when, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Warner Bros. announced that they would release its 2021 slate simultaneously in theaters and on HBO Max. Directors like Christopher Nolan and Patty Jenkins hit back against the decision.

At the time, Nolan said, “Some of our industry’s biggest filmmakers and most important movie stars went to bed the night before thinking they were working for the greatest movie studio and woke up to find out they were working for the worst streaming service.” He further accused the studio giants of not “understanding what they’re losing.” Jenkins echoed the sentiment, calling the decision “heartbreaking” before calling it the “best choice in a bunch of bad choices.” Many of these pleas fell on deaf ears as they were made at the height of the pandemic (which has currently resulted in the deaths of 6.6 million people worldwide) and during a major spike in new cases due to holiday travel.

Spielberg added that he thinks “older audiences were relieved that they didn’t have to step on sticky popcorn,” and then insisted that those same individuals were missing the “magic” of seeing a movie in theaters. He placed the overall responsibility on filmmakers, saying, “It’s up to the movies to be good enough to get all the audiences to say that to each other when the lights come back up.”

The director continued to share that he doesn’t usually view his own movies with an audience but was encouraged by his wife to watch The Fabelmans during its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival earlier this year. “I was terrified, but the movie plays to a big audience of 2,000 people, and in the funny parts, it played like a big comedy,” he shared.