Indie Veteran Stuart Ford on Netflix-Warner Deal: We Have to “Fight Tooth and Nail” Or Film Professionals Will Become “Uber Drivers” For the Tech Giants

Why It Matters

The consolidation threatens core revenue‑sharing mechanisms that sustain talent and independent financing, risking a talent exodus and reshaping the economics of film production.

Key Takeaways

• Preserve theatrical windows for Warner films
• Streaming cuts producers' backend participation
• Talent risk becoming gig‑economy “Uber drivers”
• Revenue flow disruption threatens film financing
• Industry must collectively fight tech dominance

Pulse Analysis

The looming Netflix‑Warner deal epitomizes a broader wave of studio‑streamer consolidation that has accelerated since the early 2020s. While the transaction promises scale and content libraries for the tech giant, it also concentrates distribution power in a single ecosystem. Historically, studios balanced theatrical releases with ancillary windows, allowing revenue to cascade back to financiers, talent, and ancillary markets. By folding Warner’s slate directly into Netflix’s streaming‑first model, the traditional cadence of box‑office earnings, windowed releases, and subsequent TV or home‑video sales could be compressed or eliminated, reshaping cash‑flow timelines for all stakeholders.

Ford’s critique zeroes in on the erosion of backend participation—a cornerstone of film economics. Producers, actors, and crew have long relied on residuals and profit‑share agreements that reward long‑term success beyond opening weekend receipts. The streaming model, with its flat‑fee pre‑buys and limited transparency, often sidelines these participations, effectively turning creative talent into gig‑economy contractors. This shift not only diminishes earnings potential but also undermines the incentive structure that attracts high‑caliber creators to long‑form storytelling, threatening the pipeline of ambitious, auteur‑driven projects.

To counteract these pressures, industry leaders must negotiate safeguards that preserve revenue circulation. Enforcing minimum theatrical windows for marquee titles, mandating transparent profit‑sharing clauses, and lobbying for regulatory oversight of mega‑mergers can help maintain a balanced ecosystem. Independent financiers like AGC Studios can also diversify funding sources, leveraging co‑production deals and international tax incentives to offset streaming‑driven cash‑flow gaps. Ultimately, a coordinated push to retain the traditional money‑flow architecture will be crucial for sustaining talent pipelines and ensuring the film business remains viable in an increasingly tech‑dominated landscape.

Indie Veteran Stuart Ford on Netflix-Warner Deal: We Have to “Fight Tooth and Nail” or Film Professionals Will Become “Uber Drivers” for the Tech Giants

By Patrick Brzeski, Asia Bureau Chief · February 13, 2026 · 2:42 am

AGC Studios chairman Stuart Ford, one of the independent film sector’s longest‑standing and most influential financiers, offered a blunt assessment Friday of Netflix’s potential takeover of Warner Bros. Asked during a keynote appearance at Berlin’s European Film Market whether such a deal would be good for the film business, Ford didn’t hesitate.

“Probably, no,” he said.

The former Miramax executive and producer of Hacksaw Ridge, Silence and Hit Man acknowledged that one potential safeguard would be ensuring Netflix commits long‑term to releasing Warner Bros. films theatrically “in a proper manner, with proper windowing.” That, he suggested, could help avoid “one major pitfall.”

But Ford argued the more “existential threat” posed by a studio‑streamer mega‑merger lies in a somewhat less‑attacked issue: Netflix’s longstanding business model of excluding producers and talent from meaningful backend participation tied to a film’s financial performance.

“If the culture becomes one of everybody’s an Uber driver, and we’re all just working for the big guy, we’re going to lose talent coming into this business, generationally — whether it’s film, television, micro dramas, or internet content creation,” Ford warned.

He said the industry is only now beginning to feel the downstream effects of the streaming model’s growing dominance over the past decade.

“We’re only just now starting to feel the effects in the industry of the flow of money having become interrupted, if not completely cut off, over the last 10 years as a result of streaming becoming such a major part of the distribution pipeline,” Ford said. “I’m not just talking about me as a financier, getting overages. We’re talking about the talent getting participations. We’re talking about residuals. We’re talking about the pitter‑patter of money that would flow through the entire system and recycle.”

For Ford, restoring that circulation of revenue is critical to the business’s long‑term health and survival.

“The biggest single thing that the independent film business — and the film business, per se — could do to revive itself, and I’m talking about the studio business as well, is to fight tooth and nail to preserve the business culture of money flowing through the system, as opposed to someone playing poacher and saying, ‘Ha, I got it all now. Thank you. Go make something else.’”

“If we do preserve it, I think film will continue to attract ambitious, idealistic talent,” he added. Without such a shift, he argued, the industry risks a generational brain drain.

Ford was speaking to a packed room of international producers at Winston Baker’s annual Film Finance Forum, co‑sponsored by The Hollywood Reporter and held alongside the Berlin International Film Festival. His remarks were overwhelmingly well received by the crowd, with several lines drawing sustained applause.

Ever the operator, Ford was also careful not to vilify his partners at Netflix.

“There’s no great conspiracy here,” he said. “I don’t think there’s anyone sitting in a room at Netflix going, ‘How do we stick it to the film business?’ Certainly, the executives that we all deal with day to day — some of them are people I’ve known in the industry for 20 years — they’re real cinephiles. They do a great job, and the deals they make day to day to pre‑buy movies are vital, actually, to keeping the business afloat right now.”

“But there needs to be some kind of bigger philosophical realignment within the tech sector and the media industry,” he went on. “How do we continue to attract talent into this sector? It’s a fundamental issue that people somewhat overlook.”