{"id":561910,"date":"2026-02-02T22:43:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T22:43:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/561910\/"},"modified":"2026-02-02T22:43:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T22:43:20","slug":"christopher-nolan-on-netflix-warner-bros-ai-and-being-dga-president","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/561910\/","title":{"rendered":"Christopher Nolan on Netflix-Warner Bros., AI and Being DGA President"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tChristopher Nolan<\/a> is a busy man. <\/p>\n

\n\tWhen he\u2019s not working on \u201cThe Odyssey,\u201d his sprawling adaptation of Homer\u2019s epic, he is tackling all the other challenges facing Hollywood as the new president of the Directors Guild of America.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe union\u2019s 20,000 members are dealing with a sharp decline in jobs, the rise of artificial intelligence, and the absorption of Warner Bros. into either Netflix or Paramount \u2014 which portends consolidation in streaming and a threat to the future of moviegoing.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe have very, very significant concerns about how this is all going to happen,\u201d Nolan said in his first interview as DGA<\/a> leader since being elected in September. \u201cI think it\u2019s a very worrying time for the industry. The loss of a major studio is a huge blow.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe DGA is headed into bargaining with the major studios this spring. Its contract expires on June 30, which happens to be two weeks before \u201cThe Odyssey\u201d comes out. <\/p>\n

\n\tSpeaking to three reporters around a conference table at DGA headquarters, Nolan displayed a smooth command of the guild\u2019s negotiating priorities \u2014 jobs, AI and health care \u2014 while dropping the occasional \u201cfrankly\u201d into a sentence to signal a point of conflict.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe need to look at how the new models have created this disconnect between \u2014 frankly \u2014 the level of production and overall spending from the consumer,\u201d he said, warning that changes in technology should not be an excuse to shortchange workers. \u201cThat\u2019s completely unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tA citizen of both the U.K. and the U.S., and at home in both cultures, he was also diplomatic when needed. Though he shot \u201cThe Odyssey\u201d in locations around the Mediterranean, he passed up an opportunity to slam President Trump\u2019s proposed 100% tax on movies made overseas.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI don\u2019t know how a tariff system would work,\u201d he said, judiciously. \u201cI will say that since President Trump has started bandying these ideas around, there\u2019s a much more serious conversation from the studios about how to improve the situation in the United States \u2014 to be perfectly frank about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe DGA has had high-profile presidents from the start. Frank Capra shot \u201cMr. Smith Goes to Washington\u201d while serving in the role; ditto Joseph Mankiewicz and \u201cAll About Eve.\u201d Nolan follows a succession of in-demand TV directors \u2014 Paris Barclay, Thomas Schlamme, and Lesli Linka Glatter \u2014 who held the post while juggling their day jobs.<\/p>\n

\n\tAsked how he was managing it all, Nolan said he has strong support from the staff, the board and prior DGA presidents.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI see the value of having active, working members run the guild,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m prepared to knuckle down and figure it out.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tNolan is of course famous for being one of the great champions of the theatrical experience. But as president of the DGA, he represents a constituency that largely works in television and that has struggled mightily since the end of Peak TV.<\/p>\n

\n\tNetflix\u2019s proposed acquisition of Warner Bros., which still must clear regulatory hurdles, raises concerns across the board. Filmmakers fear the loss of a major distributor, while those in TV face the potential consolidation of HBO Max into the largest streaming platform.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe DGA has not taken a position on the deal, but has had discussions with both Netflix and Paramount, which is pursuing a hostile bid for the studio.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe\u2019re interested to hear more about the specifics of how they\u2019re going to run these things,\u201d said Nolan, nine of whose films are in the Warner Bros. library.<\/p>\n

\n\tAddressing fears about the future of theaters, Netflix Co-CEO Ted Sarandos has pledged to maintain a 45-day window. (The DGA has pushed for 60 days.) Meanwhile, David Ellison, CEO of Paramount Skydance, has offered to maintain \u201chealthy, traditional\u201d windows while expanding the combined studio\u2019s theatrical output to 30 films a year.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThere are encouraging noises, but that\u2019s not the same as commitments,\u201d Nolan said, making clear that windows are not the primary issue. \u201cThe theatrical window becomes a sort of easily graspable symbol of whether Warner Bros. will be run as a theatrical distributor or whether it be folded in as a streamer. But the reality is, the issues on the television side and the streaming side are far more important to our membership.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe DGA represents not only directors, but also their crews \u2014 assistant directors, unit production managers, stage managers \u2014 who have already been hammered by a decline in domestic production.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe dropoff has been so bad that it attracted Trump\u2019s notice. Nobody in Hollywood wants a 100% tariff, but the hope is that Trump\u2019s attention can be redirected toward a federal production incentive on par with the generous rebates offered by other countries.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe way we see it, you want a stackable, 25% federal rebate that you can combine with your state rebates and be competitive with other places in the world that are siphoning production from the United States because of the excellent incentives that they have,\u201d Nolan said.<\/p>\n

\n\tNolan was quick to acknowledge that the decline in jobs is not primarily about overseas competition. Rather, he sees it as a function of business models that are changing, often to the detriment of DGA members.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIf you look at the overall spending from the consumer on media, on entertainment, on our work, it\u2019s extremely stable,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we\u2019re looking at a 35% to 40% decline in employment for our members. How do you reconcile those things? What\u2019s happening to the investment? Why aren\u2019t we reinvesting in the consumer? Because the consumer is invested in our work and values our work tremendously.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThere are always going to be ebbs and flows in the level of production,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s understood. That\u2019s a reality to deal with. But I believe we\u2019re seeing too big a disconnect between the level of investment the consumer is making and how that\u2019s being filtered down to our members in terms of employment opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Hollywood unions have all grappled in their own way with the threat of further job loss from AI. Disney\u2019s recent deal with OpenAI \u2014 which allows Sora users to play around with its iconic characters \u2014 has underscored that threat.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI see that as a positive in terms of establishing the principle of licensing,\u201d Nolan said. \u201cBut until we see how that\u2019s going to be paid through to the union members of all three unions \u2014 which, at the moment, we don\u2019t know what that\u2019s going to be \u2014 but that\u2019s when these companies will have the support of the guilds, is when they\u2019ve shown how creators are going to benefit from those kinds of licensing opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tFor the DGA, AI also raises fears about the integrity of the director\u2019s vision. In the 1980s, the union fought against colorization of black and white films. Such \u201ccreative rights\u201d battles are central to the union\u2019s mission and self-image.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYou have to have a voice in how this tool is being used,\u201d Nolan said. \u201cThere are myriad issues to do with control of our work and how it might be manipulated through AI.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThat discussion is not limited to AI, he said. As a consumer of movies, Nolan said he has noted a shift in the home theater experience. Instead of watching films uninterrupted on DVD or streaming, viewers are increasingly watching them on ad-supported platforms.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe first time it goes to the home, it\u2019s interrupted with commercial breaks,\u201d he said. \u201cThat hasn\u2019t happened, frankly, since the 1970s\u2026 In a strange way, with this brand-new technology, we\u2019re sort of looping back into those kind of scenarios.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMany of these things will be on the table when the DGA sits down with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in May. In a break with custom, the DGA will go last this year, behind SAG-AFTRA and the Writers Guild of America. Unlike the other two, the DGA did not go on strike three years ago \u2014 it never does \u2014 but it did secure most of the same terms.<\/p>\n

\n\tAll three face difficult conversations about bread-and-butter labor issues, especially funding for their health plans. As is customary for a DGA president, Nolan is not on the negotiating committee and won\u2019t be in the day-to-day talks, though he will, no doubt, be involved. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe have a responsibility to our members to look to the future, to look at what innovation is and what\u2019s going to change, but also to keep a clear head,\u201d he said. \u201cWe don\u2019t want innovation to just be an excuse to pay our members less.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Christopher Nolan is a busy man. When he\u2019s not working on \u201cThe Odyssey,\u201d his sprawling adaptation of Homer\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":561911,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[9],"tags":[26299,99980,171,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-561910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-christopher-nolan","tag-dga","tag-entertainment","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116003458635529291","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=561910"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561910\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/561911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=561910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=561910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=561910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}