The Oscar-nominated film “Argentina, 1985” has been revealed to be at the center of last week’s abrupt firing of Marvel Studios executive and post-production chief Victoria Alonso according to a lengthy new report at The Hollywood Reporter.
Alonso was one of eight producers on the Argentine historical drama that was distributed by Amazon. By signing up for the project, she reportedly breached an agreement with Marvel – violating the company’s business conduct standards which bars employees from working at competing studios.
The trade indicates that the situation reached a conclusion the week after the Oscars and ultimately led to her termination. The shake-up has rocked Marvel where she, Kevin Feige and co-president Louis D’Esposito have been the triumvirate running Marvel Studios since before “Iron Man”.
The report claims Alonso did not ask permission to work on the film. When Disney found out, she was allegedly given a dispensation on the condition she wouldn’t work on the movie further including promotion of the movie.
Then the film premiered in September at the Venice Film Festival and Alonso did further promotion for the movie as it became an awards season contender. That included appearing on the Oscars arrivals carpet with the film’s director. The trade indicates she was reportedly reminded of the breach several times.
Not helping was the visible public complaints from the VFX industry about Marvel as talk has ran rampant of overworked artists and unreasonable deadlines. Things came to a head post-Oscars and Alonso was allegedly terminated for cause.
In the wake of this report, Variety has posted a statement from Alonso’s attorney who has dismissed the claim as ridiculous and adds: “Disney & Marvel made a poor decision that will have serious consequences. There is a lot more to this story.”
Disney subsequently responded to that statement, calling it “unfortunate” and seemingly confirming the initial report saying “an indisputable breach of contract and a direct violation of company policy” were factors. Both the statements from Alonso’s attorney and Disney in full are available over on Variety.com.
The VFX industry is expected to closely watch what happens next, but it’s hoped the recent slowing down of the studio’s aggressive release schedule should at least partly alleviate the problems in regard to unreasonable schedules on Marvel projects.
Source: THR
