Shawn Levy Signs Disney 20th TV Deal After Decade At Netflix — SkimNews
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- Shawn Levy and 21 Laps Entertainment signed a multi-year overall deal with 20th Television, a Disney Television Studios label, where he will develop and produce series across Disney Entertainment's portfolio
- Dana Walden, Disney's President and Chief Creative Officer, called Levy a rare storyteller whose work is 'wildly entertaining and deeply human' across two decades with Disney
- The move comes as the Stranger Things creative team splits: the Duffer Brothers signed a massive film and TV overall deal at Paramount while Levy heads to Disney
- Levy will continue collaborating with Netflix on the Stranger Things universe, including the animated Tales From '85, which just returned for a second season with at least one more offshoot awaiting a green light
- Levy's Disney roots run deep — he directed Disney Channel's The Famous Jett Jackson early in his career and later produced Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day for Walt Disney Pictures
- On the film side, Levy directed Deadpool & Wolverine and is directing Lucasfilm's Star Wars: Starfighter with Ryan Gosling, who he is also re-teaming with on Marvel's Ghost Rider
- 20th Television has been aggressively raiding rival studios, also signing Quinta Brunson from Warner Bros. TV and Sue Naegle from Universal in recent months
Why it matters: The deal extends 20th Television's months-long raid on rival studios, adding the director-producer behind two Netflix mega-franchises to a Disney TV roster that already absorbed Quinta Brunson from Warner Bros. TV. It also signals that Levy will keep producing Stranger Things content for Netflix even after moving to Disney — the creative relationship outlasts the studio loyalty, which is rare in overall deals.
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