Warner Bros. was so desperate to get Christopher Nolan back to the studio that they offered him a seven-figure check. Starting with 2002’s Insomnia, Christopher Nolan had been one of Warner Bros.’s most prolific filmmakers, delivering multiple hits for the studio, including The Dark Knight trilogy, Inception, and Dunkirk. In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Christopher Nolan wanted his film Tenet to be the first to open in theaters following the nationwide shutdown. Tenet opened on September 3, 2020, and shortly afterward, Warner Bros. made the decision to release their entire 2021 slate of films day and date in theaters and on their streaming service, then known as HBO Max. Nolan famously criticized the decision and took his next film, the eventual Best Picture-winner Oppenheimer, to Universal Pictures.
Warner Bros. tried to lure Nolan back from Oppenheimer studio Universal by paying the fees he waived to get Tenet a theatrical release. Read More