Imax CEO Richard Gelfond Bets on the Biggest Screen

eighty countries. In preparation for the film industry's annual CinemaCon conference in Las Vegas this week, Gelfond spoke with Brent Lange, Varieties, Executive editor of Film and Media, about the box office success of Captain Marvel, the rise of Netflix, and the future of the exhibition business. So I'm here in our New York office with rich Gelfond, who is the chief executive officer of Imax Corporation, and we're sitting down. Um, it's just a couple of days after Captain Marvel has

totally dominated the box office. So I guess, Rich, first of all, I mean, what what was your sort of take on the results? Were you expecting Captain Marvel to be as big as it as it was? I was certainly expecting Captain Marvel to be big, Brent. I had seen it a couple of weeks before it came out and I thought it was one of the best Marvel movies I've ever seen, particularly an Imax and the way

it tied into Avengers, I was quite bullish. But with that said, for Imaxes opening weekend internally we had it had at about thirty million dollars worldwide, and it did thirty six million dollars worldwide, so I was surprised. I think the place I was the most surprised was the international outside of China, where we did about twelve million dollars, and in countries like Russia and France where I wasn't quite sure how a female superhero would play, it played

extraordinarily well. So I was a little surprised. Why do you think this film was so successful? What was it about it that that people responded to? I think the character was really special because, um, Bree Larson played kind of an ordinary person. Um. I know, it's been compared to Wonder Woman and we did very well, and Wonder Woman also, but Gal Gadot is much more glamorous and much more kind of extroverted, and Brie Larson is more sort of I could be your next door neighbor, but

a very tough next door neighbor. And I think people related to that. I think fanboys also were very curious how it would tie in to The Avengers, which is coming in around a month, and um, I think all of that work well. There are plot twists, UM. I think there were social statements um about women's um uh empowerment that I think we're very timely but where we are today, um, and it was just a very good movie.

Are you are you seeing that are our stories that are more inclusive, that uh have underrepresented groups with lead roles? I mean, are they playing well? I mean, is is this an area that that you think Hollywood should mind more in terms of your own box office? Well, certainly if you look at the last two years, with Black Panther last year and Captain Marvel this year, the answer would be unequivocally yes. And I think even um um, I'm trying to remember. I think it was Coco, the

Disney animated movie, which did extremely well. So I think absolutely, I think, um, you know, it's proven, it's it's long overdue. They should have tried, not just they, everyone should have tried movies outside of the traditional mainstream of characters. And it appears to be really working. Well, you know, people for years have been talking about comic book fatigue, superhero fatigue.

You know that they're there with all of these different companies launching movies about costumed heroes that that you know, there could be kind of fatigue around that the audience could reject it. You look at something like Captain Marvel or are you seen evident of this? Well, Captain Marvel was one of our top five films of all time, and the other four or the two Star Wars recent movies,

Jurassic World at Avengers. So this is the best origin story we've ever done, so certainly that's not showing evidence of fatigue. Every year we have something called the CEO Forum that IMAX runs and we invite exhibitors from all over the world of the world's box office. The CEO has come and several years ago we had Kevin Fagy, I think it was three or four years ago, and someone said at that point, are we seeing superhero fatigue? And Kevin gave one of the best answers that I

had heard. He said, you know, a comic book is just a book, and movies have been based on books for decades, and you don't run out of book. So the question is you know, do you run at a comic books. I do think maybe there's a related question, which is are there limits to sequels and how long they could play? And I think there probably are limits to sequels and at some point, you know, they die

a natural cycle. But I think that comic books there's so many different ideas, and you know, back to your last question, Brent about diversity, I think we've only begun to mind some of the diverse kinds of characters, so I think this has a long way to run. Well, that's interesting you were talking about sequels and franchises, because in any given year, those seem to be the films that are dominating the box office. Franchises seem to be

the kinds of movies that studios want to make. In the past, we've also seen some some indications that maybe there are some franchises that are getting a little long in the tooth. Does that worry you at all that the businesses so reliant on uh sequels and franchises. I think you have to separate out sequels from franchise blockbuster type properties. As you know, i'm ax is really dependent on blockbusters. Were not an exhibitor. Sometimes people say we're not.

We're North America an exhibit or well, the irony is we're not North American. Seventy of our revenues are outside of North America, and we're not an exhibitor because we don't play a lot of movies. We just play blockbuster movies. So obviously we have a special interest in making sure that blockbuster movies keep up. But if you look at you know, even this year, what's going on. Captain Marvel

is a new UM franchise that's being established. UM. Lion King, although it's related to other films, is kind of a standalone franchise coming coming along. Wonder Woman last year was a new franchise, A Leader, which did very well for us. We did close to percent of the U S box office in the Chinese box office. Was a new character

and a new franchise. So yes, you have some franchises like Avengers Endgame UM, which was filmed completely with iMX cameras, being at the end of their cycle, and you have this Star Wars segment at the end of the year being the end of the cycle. But again, if you look ahead UM to of Top Gun being revitalized, you have Chris Nolan doing a new movie. And as you know, other than Batman, Chris tends to create new franchises, and Chris really likes working with us in Imax and using

our cameras. I look forward to that, um you know the next yes he will and m So I think franchise. I think franchises will end, but new ones will start. And you know, you look at some of the um new things this year. It it's it too, but it just you know it started last year us. Um. I mean there are different kinds of projects coming in as some of the franchises fade out, and fortunately I think the public has an appetite for really good ones um that work. Um you know, going back just to December,

look whatid Aquaman? I mean that was not a franchise that existed, and we were heavily involved with that. It was h terrific film. Jason Momo is excellent. And now they've announced um Aquaman too for a few years from now. So I think there's a constant replenishment. Uh So, let's talk a little bit about what is IMAX. What do you see? Obviously I know about the technology, A lot of people have been to the theaters. How would you kind of describe the perfect IMAX film, how do you

define your brand? I think the perfect IMAX film is something that takes you somewhere you otherwise couldn't go. So I think in Aquaman, you went to the bottoms of the ocean. I think in some of these super hero movies, you're immersed in the experience. I think it's much more experiential, much more um first party than third party. So when people go to the movies, they tend to watch other people involved in the action, and the director focuses their I on the part of the movie that they want

them to act, they want them to look at. Where an IMAX I think it's just much more like your part of the experience. So the screen is bigger, the resolution is higher, the image is brighter, the sound is louder. So when you go to an IMAX and I won't even call it a movie, I'll call it an Imax experience,

it's a whole different visceral reaction. And as a matter of fact, some of the services UM whether it's in China that does online testing or exit surveys, it shows consumers like the movie much better when they see it in Imax. And the reason for that is UM. In a way, it becomes partly their own movie, not just the director's movie, because the director is creating this incredible world and UM sort of directing you way to look at it. But you can go multiple times and you

look at the world in different ways. As a matter of fact, I'm almost embarrassed to admit this, but I liked Captain Marvel so much. I saw it twice before it even open, and the second time I saw it, I liked it even better than the first time because I was more familiar with the story, so I could enjoy the visual experience even more so. I think the common elements when you said, you know what would be the ideal one would be visual splendor. Place you can

feel you're traveling to that you couldn't go. And by the way, that's one reason the Imax documentaries works so well. Apollo eleven just came out in Imax and the numbers were very impressive. Free Solo, which won the Academy Award UM, came out in Imax. Historically, our space films are underwater films. I think Imax is a truly transportive mechanism, and you

can't get anything like that on the couch. And I think that's one one reason why, when the rest of the movie business is sort of chugging along at relatively slow growth rates, were growing so rapidly because the consumer can see lots of things in the home that are not that distinguished from what they're seeing at a move V. But I think they're incredibly distinguished from what you see

at IMAX. You've also spawned imitators. Uh, A lot of companies have their own premium large formats or whatever they're called. I mean, what's your response to those kinds of experiences. Well, you know, copying is the greatest form of flattery. It's obviously going to happen. I think the whole industry has gone more premium, and I think that's partly because of in home entertainment. So for people to leave the home, Um, they want something else that they can't get in the home.

But if you look at some measurements like percentage of box office that IMAX does so um, you know, typically if we have our d n A in it, meaning our cameras or aspect ratio or some other element, um where somewhere around twelve of the film on a typical and that's in North America. In China, it's kind of similar. The rest of the world. In territories where we are it's similar, but we're not in every country, although we're in a lot of them. But UM, the point is

our indexing has gone up. In the last several years, has been more and more of these knockoff IMAX theaters, and I think that says something. The whole category has obviously grown a great deal, but I think as people get educated to seeing a premium way to see a movie, they realize that there's an enormous IMAX difference, so um, you know, they'll seek out IMAX. Now, a lot of these copycats don't have UM proprietary technology, almost all of them.

All they do is take a regular UM uh D C p UM digital one and they play it on a bigger screen. And as any kid knows has ever put their hands on a xerox machine or tried to blow things up, UM, the bigger it is the worst it looks. And I think, you know, a lot of people thought by putting X in their names that they could confuse consumers and have consumers say, you know, well, it's got an excit and it's a big screen, it

must be like IMAX. But again, if you look at the empirical evidence, Um, I think I'd add to that, which is probably even more important is the directors themselves. So you know, when Chris Nolan releases a movie, or when the Russo brothers are releasing Avengers, which they film with IMAX cameras, you know, they don't go see it, say see it in brand X. They all say, go see it in IMAX. And I think a lot of

the fan boys and fan women follow that lead. So you know, at some level, maybe it's good for the business to educate people, um to the way to see a movie is, you know, not at home, not on a small device, and not even on a small screen. But at the end of the day, people aren't full they know IMAX is the real thing. You were talking about im X DNA having parts of the IMAX DNA, and I assume you're you're talking about IMAX cameras. How

many films typically use your cameras? Are there any that are coming up that that have relied on them heavily? So it's not just the cameras, although that that's part of it, Brent so Um, it could be things UM like aspect ratio. Regular cinema is much more vertical UM to three five aspect ratio. Typically Imax is much more vertical. So our aspect ratio could go anywhere from one six

five to one nine. And a number of the movies, UM, including Captain Marvel which just came out, have more Imax UM footage in them, and that just means it fills more of the IMAX screen. It depends on the movie and it depends on the theater. UM. But you know, one of the things we say is twenty six percent more image when we're doing the aspect ratio, and many filmmakers covered to that. I'm X aspect great show UM

when they shoot beyond that. As you said, UM, there are instances where we use Imax cameras and there are a number of films this year that are using Imax cameras as well as next year. UM. I mentioned to next year, Chris Nolan is using it. UM. The Russo Brothers used Imax cameras to film the entire UM Avengers Endgame that's coming out soon. UM. There are a number of other movies UM that we haven't announced yet that that are using them. We have announced wonder Woman is

using Imax cameras. So over the next couple of years, if you asked me, I would say, you know, probably four to six will use the camera, and more than that will have special Imax DNA in it. The cameras themselves are are pretty heavy, right, I mean, is that have you been able to to slim them down it at all? Well, there are two kinds of cameras. There

are digital cameras and there are film cameras. So the digital cameras what we've been working on a special lenses that fit on cameras that filmmakers are used to working with. So those are just regular cameras that can and then they're enhanced by Imax to enable them to capture the Imax um aspect ratio and the IMAX characteristics. They're also film cameras, which you're referring to, which are heavy cameras. UM. No, we can't lighten them because uh, fifteen seventy film is

really big and really heavy. Um. But filmmakers UM, primarily led by Chris Nolan um have learned how to maneuver those cameras. So I can't say I wasn't nervous at first, but Chris has figured out, you know, how to put them in airplanes. Um, we figured out how to take them underwater. Um. You know we've done scenes handheld. As you may remember years ago, they were carried to the top amount Everest. So they are not ideal to work with. But on the other hand, the output is so phenomenal

and the response is so great. So you know, on some of these movies where we've used our cameras, we've indexed over of the box office. So I think the filmmakers find it worthwhile. And if it's just too much for the way they've designed the movie because of the way they'll use a digital camera. Uh, as we sit down. Just moments ago, actually, uh, Disney announced that it's gonna be closing its Steel to acquire Fox on March. UM,

I wonder what consolidation means for you. Are you worried that there's gonna be a fewer one fewer studio providing content for your theaters? Do you think? Uh, there will be new players who will emerge who will fill that void. So in our case, I'm not worried, and that's because Disney is one of our best partners in the world. And um, Disney and Imax have developed an organization wide

close working relationships. So UM for Captain Marvel, Disney produced special art with IMAX's frame around it and uses us as a marketing tool for the campaign. And I think Disney really understands that the brand association between Disney and Marvel, are particularly on a global basis because we're in eighty countries, is a good thing for Disney. I think UM the Imax name helps in a way curate a very crowded field. It says to the audience, this is a special movie.

Maybe it was filmed a special way. It's certainly shown a certain way, and the filmmakers will talk about it. And I think as Disney acquires Fox, UM Disney will UM do even a better job than Fox at eventicizing some of the Fox movies. So the most obvious ones are the UM the reuniting of the Marvel universe, and I think UM Disney and Kevin Figi will do a really good job of further promoting that. But we already

had a very good experience with Fox. Some Bohemian Rhapsody was a huge upside surprise for us, and Alito was another one that was some UM you know, surprise upside for us. So I think Disney will further try and evmtasize the Fox properties, and given our relationship and given our position as the place to evmtasize content out of home, I think that will be very positive. I'm the second

part of your question about additional content. UM. I do think because um the theater the studios are going into streaming, and the streaming companies are going into theatrical, there'll be an abundance of new content. And I do think, again, going back to the point I just made about curating, I think people are gonna try and separate themselves in

the field. So when you know one of the streaming service as spends over a hundred million dollars UM to make a film online, I think it's going to have to have a theatrical run at some point. And I know your next question will be about windows, UM, but I think they're gonna come to terms what they're needing to be some windows if they want Theatrical and Imax to play them. So I think, you know, in addition to Disney UM Fox being part of a broader good trend,

there's just a lot more content. And again, when you go in the future and whether it's released theatrically or whether it's released streaming wise, UM, how are you going to curate all that content? And I think you know, particularly over the past five to ten years, IMAX has played a pivotal role in curating and and kind of pointing audiences with UM with our blue frame and saying this is where you see it in a special way.

So I think I don't know exactly how it'll play out bround, we have to see that, but I think it's going to be good for us. Well, you you absolutely correctly anticipated my next question, which is about when doing I mean, what do you think UM is going to happen with this debate? I mean, we've already seen a lot of very heated emotions around this issue, around the issue of Netflix and when and if they're going to be any kind of theatrical release with its films.

Is there gonna be some middle ground found here? UM? If you ask my guests, the answer would be yes. Again, because of UM we're housed in UM and multipoxes, and our partners or exhibitors will only play films if our exhibition partners agree to it. Period. End of it. But with that said, I do think it's going to come to a middle ground at some point. Um. You saw

Netflix with Roma started to chip away at it. UM. I don't know if you saw the ad during the Oscars for The Irishman with Netflix, but they made a point to say there was a theatrical release. And I believe, um, there'll be a bigger windows than they were around Roma. Whether they're good enough for exhibitors and therefore whether we play it as an open story, but I do think

they're gonna move in that direction. And I think if they do move in that direction, eventually, UM, some of them, some of the studios are gonna meet in the middle somewhere. With that said that theatrical experience is crucial. UM. I went with my wife to Pompeii UM this summer and there was a theater built thousands of years ago. And you know, the theatrical experience is something that's existed, um for extremely long time as part of human civilization. And

there's been all kinds of changes in the movie industry. Obviously, there's been talking, there's been television, there's been DVD, there's been VHS, there's been and now there's streaming and movies have survived all of those. In the theater is still a very very special experience, and I think it's gonna

remain so, you know, way way into the future. But you know, whether the right number is twelve weeks or whatever it is, I do think they're gonna be economic pressures where UM the exhibitors are going to agree over time to some middle ground. I mean, do you think the theatrical window is too long at ninety days or whatever it is? Roughly it seems like studios maintain it

is too long. So you know, Fortunately for IMAX, I don't have to get into that debate because we play movies for one week or two weeks, and in an occasional case it will be three weeks. We're not in the UM movie business per se. We're in the blockbuster business. So you know, whatever the windows are, UM people are gonna want to see Captain Marvel, Avengers, Star Wars, Lion King, Wonder Woman, et cetera in IMAX, So you know, I

don't have to weigh into that debate. I think, you know, wherever they all work out, it's going to be fine for US UM three D. A few years ago, people were very high on it. They thought it was a great way to differentiate film between kind of home entertainment. What happened. It seems like it's just sort of a

non event these days, at least domestically. I think. UM. I think studios worldwide got carried away with three D, and I think the early successes like Avatar and uh Alice in Wonderland, the numbers were so strong that I think studios thought we could put a lot of things in the three D and it would work. And I think the consumer was just smarter than that, and the consumer knew what was generic three D and what was phony three D. And I think phony three D was

done to drive up ticket prices. UM, I don't expect you to remember this brand. But as a matter fact, when three D first came out UM at CinemaCon, I stood up and I said, UM, I don't want to take the vodka out of the punch bowl, but I don't think UM three D is a silver bullet. And I said that because Imax had had a lot of experience with three D, we weren't new to the game. UM. I think it still remains in certain territories like China

and Russia very popular. But I also think if it's um embedded in the film and in what the filmmaker was thinking, there's still a place for three D. So if you look at you know, I mentioned again Jim Cameron and UM did a lead of Battle Angel UM. We played that in three D and it did very well because it was a generic three D movie. A Ready Player one which Spielberg did, was designed to be a three D movie, and you know, that did extremely

well in three D. UM. I think, you know, around the corner at the end of we have Avatar coming, which Jim Cameron is clearly signing as a three D movie, and I think we're all gonna have to respect that. But I think it just got flooded with taking movies that really weren't envisioned the right way or film the right way, and they were um put into three D, and I just don't think particularly domestic audiences had an

appetite for that. You know, we'll see whether foreign audiences continue to prefer three D over two D in a really broadway or whether that whether that comes in and I think we'll follow where the consumer taste go. Do you think UM another Avatar film could reinvigorate three D. Do you think that that could kind of have another rediscovery of that format in a way? I I hope not. I mean, I hope it invigorates interest for Avatar and three D if that's what UM, Jim Cameron and John

Landell are trying to do. UM, I hope it doesn't reinvigorate you know, take any movie and put it in three D, because personally, I think that's the best way to experience UM those types of things. I think if it's intended to be UM, you know, then grade. But if it's not intended to be I don't think we should force consumers to watch what they don't want because we wanted to hire ticket price. You've been very successful in China. I was looking at your most recent quarter.

It seems like the Chinese box office has been very good to IMAX. UM. Other entertainment companies have not had as positive and experience in China despite you know, the box office growth there. What's gone well for IMAX and what's gone wrong for for other players in that space. So in the first quarter of this year, UM, we're up sixty percent year over year in China and our Chinese New Year UM was up year over year over last year's China New Year, So a lot of things

have gone well for I'm at. So I'll start at a higher level and then getting the needs. UM. We've been in China for about twenty years, and UM we really constructed a company around local taste and local management. So we're not a North American company that's exporting um our ideas to China. We have over a hundred people that work in China. We have a Chinese CEO, UM where a public company on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange,

of which we own seventy of it. We have lots of Chinese shareholders, we have lots of Chinese partners on the studio side UM as well as on the exhibition side and the talent side. And we've approached China and as a market unto itself, meaning UM, you know, we don't treat China like we treat the rest of the world, and we apply you know, different rules, different marketing techniques, different perspective. So that's kind of the high level answer

to your question. At a lower level, UM, you know, taste have changed rapidly in China in the last couple of years, so we've gone much more to local programming. So even in the last couple of years, in seventeen we had of what we showed in Imax theaters was local content, and in eighteen it was thirty three, and um, you know, I I see that continuing to go up. The other thing in China is that it's very difficult

to predict what the number one film is. I think because of the way tracking works in North America and the existence of sequels, it's easier to say, um, you know, Avengers is going to be a really big movie when it opens, whereas in China um on on something like Chinese New Year, it's just much more difficult to assess. So what we're doing now is we're playing multiple movies um, rather than one movie on Chinese New Years. So this year,

UM there were there were three movies. We played Crazy Aliens, Pegasus and Wandering Earth, and everyone said Crazy Aliens was going to be number one, and some people said Wandering Earth would be number four. So funny thing happened on the first day. It started to play out by that, but by the second day it was clear that Wandering

Earth was by far um the most popular film. So we changed our programming with our partners UM much more so towards Wandering Earth, and it ended up being our biggest release in our history in China, where we did forty million dollars UM in box office. So that flexibility and programming UM was a really big deal for us. UM. We also changed our marketing a little bit. UM in China of the tickets are sold online UM, which is

much greater than almost anywhere in the world. So in North America, if you did a marketing campaign, you do bus shelters, you do big posters, you do tell television. But in China, it's much more important to be allied with the ticketing platforms. The largest ticketing platform in China is called malo Yan, which has a six market share, and they recently went public in Hong Kong and we

participated in that and became a cornerstone investor. And since that investment a little bit before actually we've been starting to have more of a strategic relationship with them, so that means more access to data. Was starting a frequent flyer kind of program for our customers, and we're going to try and use the data to help us even in the selection process. So I think you really had to adapt to the changing China market. A few years ago,

it was easy. It was growing at forty percent a year, and um, you know, the tide was um flowing so hard. All you had to do was get in front of it and it would lift you up. But I think you had to learn to deal with I'm not only more local content, but what kinds of local content and more of the particulars of that market. And I think we've done that and that's why we've been pretty successful.

You were talking about a frequent flyer program. I wondered, is there any role for a subscription service at Imax, either domestically or or overseas. Would you ever think about doing some kind of movie pass type thing but geared at at Imax customers. Um, At the present, we're not thinking about that. UM. As I said in China, it's more if you go multiple times, you get prizes or extra times to go that sort of thing. Um. We're

embedded in a number of theater operators existing programs. So in Europe we're in Cineworld's program, We're in Odeon's program, we're in path As program, We're in a number of them. In the US, we're in Cinemas program and A m C has just put in place an interest program called a List where if you subscribe to their program, you can go to either regular theaters or Imax theaters. And

it's a different kind of model. Um, we're experimenting. I don't know which one is better, but I do know that our indexing, our percentage of box office continues to go up and UM with the A m C program, it's even gone up more than with other programs. So I think embedding ourselves and I'm trying different programs and understanding what works and doesn't work is ultimately going to be good for IMAX. But I think these programs will get more refined and we'll learn more about what are

the best kinds. Um. Your stock is is improving recently, but it's had kind of a rough go of it, and it's not just Imax. All sort of exhibition stocks have gotten had a rough go of it in the last few years. Why has the streat been so pessimistic about this space and what are they getting right or wrong? Well, you know you're right, but first let's talk about Imax. When you say this space, Imax isn't in that space, as I said earlier, We're not North American and we're

not an exhibitor. As a matter of fact, IMAX in eighty countries is in more places than Starbucks. So I'll address IMAX first, which is UM. You know, we have no debt and over a hundred million dollars UM in cash. UM. We don't put money into real estate or facilities. We license our intellectual property. We have extremely high margins UM.

We play only Blockbuster films. UM. So I think with respect to IMAX, and I understand it a little because there aren't comparables, and the street has trouble value in things when there aren't comparables. But you know, I think IMAX is more like a technology company or a licensing company, and I think, UM, the street gets confused about that.

But as you said more recently, as we've broken out of the pack, and while the rest of the industry, of the exhibition industry is kind of UM, you know down this quarter, we're up because of our global presence, particularly over last year and against UM analyst estimates UM.

As for the exhibition industry, you know, I think the street gets a little confused as to the role of of streaming going forward, and I think there's an irrational fear factor that streaming is going to be sort of an existential event UM for theatrical which I don't think

is going to be the case. Most of the studios have gotten more into the blockbuster business, which I don't see as UM particularly threatened by streaming, and I think UM the exhibition business is also diversifying and will continue to diversify into different types of alternative content, premium UM, different food offerings. So I think they're just UM overlooking the evolution that's going on and and marketing, I mean, the brilliant marketing things that a lot of those companies

are doing. And I'm just circling back to where I started. To the extent they're confusing that, I think they're even confusing it more with IMAX, because as I mentioned to earlier, I think streaming has nothing to do with IMAX, because I think in the first two weeks people are going to see blockbuster movies, whether they could see them, you know, six weeks later on their phone or twelve weeks later

on their phone. So sort of been closing. I'm interested in hearing your thoughts on what's the biggest obstacle that cinema faces and what's the biggest opportunity. I think the biggest obstacle UM cinema faces is probably figuring out how to market to Gen X and millennials. And I think Cinnamon General has been, you know, a little bit caught in a place where it's still marketing. Starting to change

um in the last couple of years. But one studio executive who I won't mention, told me that he told his team that for the next movie, he um, he doesn't want to hear double trunk ads, bus stop ads, posters on the wall, TV ads, And the team came back with the next movie and it was exactly the same thing, and it was pulling his hair out of his head. He didn't have much, so that's a giveaway. But um, he didn't. He didn't have much hair to

pull out. But I think the system is really embedded in a way of doing things that is very hard to change, and I think it's got to change. And um, I mentioned to you before. We have a CEO conference every year and ours is right before CinemaCon this year. One of the big topics we're going to try and tackle is how could studios and exhibitors work together and sharing data and targeting it. So I'd say that's the biggest obstacle UM. I think the biggest opportunity is how

much content there is coming out right now. And I think people just have to think of content in different ways. And I don't only mean UM studios and streaming services, but I mean, you know, on a broader level, things like the sports, things like concerts, things like UM all

kinds of live events that are going on. Destination entertainment is exploding, and particularly IMAX is a form of destination entertainment, and I think all of us have to think outside the box UM intended pun and think of how to turn yourselves more into a destination entertainment company. And that's something we're doing well. Rich thanks so much for joining me today. Thanks Brian, thanks for listening. Be sure to tune in next week for another episode of Strictly businessm