‘Soul’ departs June release date, displaces ‘Raya and the Last Dragon’

Disney Pixar’s “Soul” is the latest Hollywood film to be displaced from its initial release date due to the coronavirus pandemic.

On Monday, the studio announced that the upcoming animated feature starring Tina Fey and Jamie Foxx would no longer arrive in theaters on June 19. Instead, it will debut on Nov. 20.

This move pushes “Raya and the Last Dragon,” a feature from Disney’s other animation studio, Walt Disney Animation Studios, from Nov. 25, to March 12, 2021. Another yet-to-be-named live-action Disney film that was originally expected to hit theaters on that date is now undated.

These are just the latest calendar changes to hit the film industry. Disney, Universal, Warner Bros., Sony and more have been forced to postpone release dates as social distancing restrictions have caused theaters across the U.S. to shutter temporarily.

Currently, analysts and theater owners predict cinemas will be reopened by mid-June, but there is no guarantee that that will be the case. So, studios are hedging their bets and pushing their release dates just in case.

With “Soul” gone from its June spot, there are now only two films with June release dates left on the calendar. Universal’s “King of Staten Island,” starring Pete Davidson and directed by Judd Apatow, and Lionsgate’s “Fatale” a suspense film starring Hilary Swank and Michael Ealy, are still slated for June 19.

Representatives for Universal and Lionsgate did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

With theaters closed for the foreseeable future and studios postponing blockbusters until 2021, this year’s box office is expected to fall more than 40{3c4481f38fc19dde56b7b1f4329b509c88239ba5565146922180ec5012de023f} compared with last year, Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter wrote in a research note Monday.

He estimates the 2020 box office will reach around $6.6 billion. The last time the box office was this low was in 1998 when the industry reported $6.7 billion in ticket sales.

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