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Hollywood survival strategies in the post-COVID 19 era

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  • Michael Johnson

    (California State University)

Abstract

Since the arrival of the Coronavirus in the United States, Americans have been forced to quarantine themselves at home in dramatic fashion, unlike almost any other time in the nation’s history. Moreover, the American workforce has been equally impacted by virtue of state-imposed shutdowns that have affected innumerable businesses, including the Hollywood entertainment industry, which is the subject of this research. I examine how commercial entertainment conglomerates like AT&T, Comcast, Disney, ViacomCBS, and Fox have responded to mandatory closures for businesses that employ a human workforce upon whom they rely for their labor, and to human consumers they seek to distribute their film and television commodities to for profit. Using historical and discourse analyses in a political economic theoretical framework, I review contemporary reports about the economic conditions which have influenced the industry’s technological adaptation and innovation and argue that the Hollywood television and film industries will capitalize upon this current public health crisis as a motivator to adopt streaming platforms as the new preferred distribution mechanism of entertainment long after COVID 19 is a memory. This qualitative research examines the technological adaptations employed by these entertainment conglomerates to analyze (1) how the transition to streaming video on demand has occurred, and evaluates (2) what the adoption of these survival strategies mean for Hollywood’s long-term economic future and survival in a “digitally competitive” (Smith and Telang, 2017) marketplace.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Johnson, 2021. "Hollywood survival strategies in the post-COVID 19 era," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 8(1), pages 1-8, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:8:y:2021:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-021-00776-z
    DOI: 10.1057/s41599-021-00776-z
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Mike Grimshaw, 2017. "Digital society and capitalism," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 3(1), pages 1-3, December.
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    Cited by:

    1. Liza Lee & Ying-Sing Liu, 2024. "The impact of major infectious disease events and government relief packages on the film industry: evidence from Taiwan," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-11, December.
    2. Delre, Sebastiano A. & Luffarelli, Jonathan, 2023. "Consumer reviews and product life cycle: On the temporal dynamics of electronic word of mouth on movie box office," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    3. McMahon, James, 2022. "The Political Economy of Hollywood: Capitalist Power and Cultural Production; introduction," EconStor Open Access Book Chapters, in: The Political Economy of Hollywood: Capitalist Power and Cultural Production, pages 1-10, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    4. Daniel Javier de la Garza Montemayor & Daniel Barredo Ibáñez & Mayra Elizabeth Brosig Rodríguez, 2023. "Digital Habits of Users in the Post-Pandemic Context: A Study on the Transition of Mexican Internet and Media Users from the Monterrey Metropolitan Area," Societies, MDPI, vol. 13(3), pages 1-12, March.

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