Disney has revealed that they have spent $645 million on the creation of the acclaimed Star Wars series streaming on Disney+, Andor.
What’s Happening:
- According to new reports, Disney has reported that the cost of making the popular Star Wars series, Andor, has rocketed to $645 million, collectively.
- This total includes the record cost of $290.9 million that Disney has reportedly spent on the second season of the show, which will debut in April of 2025.
- The news comes from Forbes, which reports that this is the highest-ever annual spending on a Star Wars production that has been disclosed in Disney’s public filings.
- The sum is more than is spent on full Star Wars features, including the $280.7 million spent on Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
- The number for Andor is actually expected to increase, as the amount reported was spent during the year up to November 22nd, 2023, and doesn’t cover all of the shoot, which was delayed in the summer of 2023 due to the SAG-AFTRA strike. The shoot resumed in January of 2024, and wrapped the following month before the project moved into post-production, where much of those signature Star Wars visual effects were added.
- Streaming show budgets are typically a closely-guarded secret by all the major studios, who typically combine the amount spent on all the streaming production in overall expenses, and don’t typically itemize each project.
- In the Forbes report, Disney did not comment and does not typically discuss the costs of individual productions. Regarding the cost of Star Wars shows like Andor, that data came straight from a financial statement from the company.
- Productions filmed in the U.K. are subject to a higher level of financial disclosure as the government there reimburses up to 25.5% of the cost of production while filming there. As part of an effort to get this reimbursement, and a large amount of financial wizardry (more of which can be read in the report from Forbes), Disney has a company in the UK which has to file annual financial statements for their productions there.
- In the case of Andor, it was a Disney subsidiary, E&E Industries, which was originally founded back in 2018 to produce a Star Wars film based on Obi-Wan Kenobi. After a series of events, this became the production company for Andor, which was filmed at the Pinewood Studios outside of London and on location throughout the U.K.
- The cost reveals of Andor come from the filings of E&E, which also shows that the UK reimbursed $129.3 million in return for filming there, bringing Andor’s costs down to $515.7 million, with fiscal statements confirming “the final cost was forecasted to be within the production budget.”
- Reportedly, those final bits of filming and post-production in 2024 will increase the cost, but unlikely that it will rise much further, considering that season two is said to be the conclusion of the series.
- Revealed at D23 Brazil last month, The first season of Andor takes place over the course of a year, but season two is expected to take place over four years, leading right up to the events of Rogue One.
- Season Two of Andor is set to arrive on April 22nd, 2025.
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