Why does NBC have "The Incedibles" & ABC have "Shrek the Halls"?

Mufasa's Pride

New Member
Original Poster
This Thanksgiving, NBC will host the Network Premiere of Disney/Pixar's "The Incredibles". This December, ABC will host the World Premiere of the new Christmas Special "Shrek the Halls."

Why does ABC, a Disney company, have the rights to a Universial/Dreamworks program, while Universial-owned NBC has exclusive rights to a Disney/Pixar movie? Was this some sort of trade-off in which each network thinks they can get higher viewership advantage for another company's programs? Is this an atttempt by Jeff Katzenberg, Steven Speilburg, and other Dreamworks owners to mend ties with The Walt Disney Company and Pixar?

Just struck me as odd....

http://www.movieweb.com/tv/news/32/15632.php
http://www.nbc.com/Movies_Specials_More/
 

Monty

Brilliant...and Canadian
In the Parks
No
Networks and production companies owned by the same conglomerate still operate as independent businesses. As a result, if a Disney-owned production company is marketing a movie to the networks, they'll sell to the highest bidder, thus increasing their profit margin. They might have marching orders to "give preference" to another company in the same conglomerate, but to order them to only sell "in-house" would be fiscally irresponsible. Shareholders would be justifiably irate if they ever did so.
 

darthjohnny

Active Member
Yeah. Networks do this all the time.

It's the same reason USA (an NBC-Universal Network) shows National Treasure and has the rights to show all three Pirates of the Caribbean films, while Disney may show stuff like Universal's Leave it to Beaver on the Disney Channel. But that doesn't mean Disney can't show their films too.
 

Mufasa's Pride

New Member
Original Poster
Networks and production companies owned by the same conglomerate still operate as independent businesses. As a result, if a Disney-owned production company is marketing a movie to the networks, they'll sell to the highest bidder, thus increasing their profit margin. They might have marching orders to "give preference" to another company in the same conglomerate, but to order them to only sell "in-house" would be fiscally irresponsible. Shareholders would be justifiably irate if they ever did so.

Thanks for clearing things up, Monty and Darthjohnny!

So, this means Disney has to pay regular price for primetime advertisments on ABC?
 

TheDisneyMagic

Well-Known Member
I can't remember whether this was last Christmas or the year before but I was amazed to see inside the Disney-MGM Studios posters advertising The Grinch being shown on ABC, how crazy is that considering Universal have a Grinch parade at Christmas time.
 

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