Disney reportedly spent approximately a little over $105 million on pre-production and filming of its sword and sorcery series “Willow,” the Lucasfilm-produced sequel to the 1988 film and a series that the streamer pulled from the service just six months after release.
Budgets of streaming shows are usually confidential as studios combine costs with other overall expenses, rarely itemising how much they spend on each.
“Willow” though was made in the United Kingdom, where streaming productions benefit from the UK’s Television Tax Relief scheme that requires itemised disclosure of spending and publicly-available financial statements regarding the production companies set up specifically for each project.
According to Forbes, recently filed financial statements that cover pre-production and filming of the series have revealed that it incurred costs of $105.9 million.
Net spending on the show was reduced by a $20.4 million cash reimbursement for filming in the UK and a further $5.1 million grant from Welsh local government – reducing the cost to $80.4 million.
However, the outllet adds that the figure will soar in the next set of financial statements which will include the bulk of the expenses for post-production work led by ILM’s London office.
The production filmed at 32 locations across the country, built five sets at Dragon Studios and twenty additional buildings for the purposes of creature creation, puppeteering work, special effects and costumes.
Warwick Davis, Erin Kellyman, Ellie Bamber and Tony Revolori starred in the eight-part series developed by Jonathan Kasdan. It debuted late last year before being pulled in May during Disney’s content purge.
Reviews for the series were good, but viewership was amongst the lowest for a Disney+ show, according to Samba TV analytics.
