Marvel’s Victoria Alonso Shoots Over Argentina, 1985 – The Hollywood Reporter
Oscar nominated drama Argentina, 1985 The center of a surprise shootout last week was for longtime Marvel Studios CEO Victoria Alonso, Hollywood Reporter to learn.
Alonso was one of eight global production producers distributed by Amazon. However, by doing so, she has breached her contract multiple times, according to sources. After repeated warnings, the situation came to a head a week after the Oscars and eventually led to her termination. It was a seismic shake-up at Marvel, as for years Alonso was part of the holy trinity – along with Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige and co-president Louis D’Esposito – that drove the Marvel Cinematic Universe to ever greater heights.
According to people familiar with the matter, Alonso broke an agreement in 2018 that she deemed violated the company’s standards of business conduct that employees would not work for competing studios.
Sources say Alonso did not ask permission to work Argentina, 1985 She gave no notice, but did the movie of her own free will. (However, the IndieWire piece A post last month on the film stated that she had permission.) When Disney learned of the project and the breach, her long service and veteran status led the company to grant her an exemption on the condition that she never work on the film again. . She also should not have promoted or publicized it in any way. Placing a senior executive working on a film outside company boundaries was deemed serious enough to involve the management audit team and a new memorandum was signed, according to an insider.
A representative for Alonso declined to comment. A representative for Disney declined to comment.
The film premiered in September 2022 at the Venice International Film Festival and the drama quickly became on the awards track. Alonso then found herself front and center in the circuit of presentations, questions and answers, panels and interviews.
According to the sources, she was reminded of her agreement and breach several times but the appearances continued. She even appeared on the Oscars arrival carpet and not as a Marvel executive attached to that studio’s multiple nominees Black Panther: Wakanda Forever Rather, as a producer, she walks with the director of her movie, Santiago Miter.
What also worried Disney executives was that as she worked to promote her film, her scope of work in visual effects for Marvel as head of physical production, post-production, visual effects and animation production was busier than ever.
Over the past year or so, as Marvel has set an unprecedented bar for series and movies, a general impression has emerged that VFX artists have not been treated well by Marvel, which he attributes to factors including long working hours, very tight deadlines, and a lack of a singular. Vision.
Movies, including the February release Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumaniawas criticized for sub-par visual effects work while Alonso’s reputation became more polarizing.
“You can just ask someone to stay up until 1 a.m. I work on VFX shots for a long time before things start to fall apart,” says one post-production source. Another post-production talent says she avoided working with Marvel because of Alonso’s reputation for being tough.
However, she had her supporters, incl eternal The star, Salma Hayek, who described her as “the best Jiva ever” in December 2021 after.
Anyway, things came to a head after the Oscars, and Alonso was terminated for cause.
About Alonso, who was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1985 It was a personal story. The film stars Ricardo Darín as Julio Cesar Stracera, a prosecutor who leads a case against those behind Argentina’s rule of military terror that results in the disappearance of 30,000 people. “I’ve written a lot of stories about superheroes,” Alonso said. IndieWire In the story published last month. “And I always wanted to tell a story about what happened in Argentina, because I had to be one of those 30,000 people.”
The shooting from Alonso was sudden and shocked the town due to its calm nature. Some have speculated that Alonso was silenced because she was vocal against Florida’s “Don’t Say Like Me” bill. “As long as I’m at Marvel Studios, I’m going to fight for representation,” Alonso, who is gay, said at the time. Disney took a stand against the bill, which led to a clash with the state government and the eventual loss of special tax status. It’s a move likely to cost the company millions.
But other sources say that speaking out only increased Alonso’s image within the company. She was asked to represent the company on GLAAD’s board of directors, joined Pride 365’s corporate leadership team and struck a deal with the company’s publishing division to write a memoir.
In any case, the visual effects industry will be keeping a close eye on the following. Marvel is one of their biggest VFX clients due to the scope of their work – their support columns regularly have in excess of 2,000 VFX shots, sometimes a whopping 3,000 per movie.
It’s unclear who will take over Alonso in the meantime – at least some of Sellers is now working with VFX producer Jen Underdahl for the time being. The insider acknowledges that whoever takes on her duties may face similar challenges to Alonso, who helped direct the never-before-seen 18 films, TV shows and specials released by Marvels in 2021-22.
“Whatever criticisms leveled against it,” says one sound effects professional, “it’s not an island. Part of the problem is the strict release schedules.”
That already tight schedule could be in the rearview mirror, as returning CEO Bob Iger has stated his intent to slow Marvel’s production.
— Caroline Giardina and Aaron Koch contributed to this report.