Disney CEO addresses Gina Carano firing

A few weeks back, Disney fired The Mandalorian star Gina Carano (Cara Dune) over what it called “abhorrent and unacceptable” social media behavior. Word is that they’d been looking for a reason to let her go for a while, ever since she refused to read a Disney-approved apology for the first of these incidents, which involved her mocking the practice of pronoun-sharing. Then she mocked the practice of wearing masks during the pandemic, peddled former President Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud, and finally likened political divisions to the plight of Jews during the Nazi Holocaust, which was apparently the final straw for Disney.

Per Variety, a Disney investor asked CEO Bob Chapek about the firing during a recent investor call. Naturally, Chapek didn’t address the situation directly, but instead talked about how Disney was interested in standing for “values that are universal” such as “decency” and “integrity,” as well as making “content that is reflective of the rich diversity of the world that we live in.”

That is a solid non-answer from a guy who obviously doesn’t want to sink into the rancid morass of online political discourse any more than he has to. “I don’t really see Disney as characterizing itself as right-leaning or left-leaning,” Chapek said. And at another point, he said: “The fact is that we have a tremendous opportunity now to bring this country back together and unite people. One thing we can all agree on is the power of Disney to unite us all.”

I don’t expect a Disney executive to seriously try and justify a sensitive decision like this, because looking like he’s taking a side either way would risk offending one group or another. But as the firing itself shows, high-profile companies can’t avoid these kinds of situations. While Carano was making her controversial posts, Disney was flooded with calls for her to be fired. After the company took action, it bore the brunt of a backlash. Either way, they’re taking a stand, no matter how much Chapek tries to stay above the fray.

At the end of the day, Disney is in the business of making lots and lots of money, and it thought taking action was the best way to ensure that it would keep doing that. And they’re having a ton of success: Disney+ recently passed 100 million subscribers, doing in just over a year what it took Netflix a decade to do.

Disney CEO says he wants Kathleen Kennedy running Star Wars “for many years to come”

But the divisiveness is out there, and even a tripling of Disney’s stock price isn’t going to keep it out of the ears of investors. For instance, while The Mandalorian has been both a critical and commercial hit, there has been a lot of fan blowback over the two most recent mainline Star Wars movies, The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker. One shareholder asked if Kathleen Kennedy, who has run Lucasfilm since 2012, would be fired and replaced with Favreau.

The short answer is no. Chapek said he was “absolutely thrilled” with Kennedy’s performance. “We look forward to having Kathy directing the activities of the entire Lucasfilm operation for many years to come.”

Things on the Star Wars front are fairly quiet at the moment, but don’t worry: Disney has a lot of new stuff coming up.

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