Kevin Feige Named Chief Creative Officer of Marvel
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Kevin Feige’s universe continues to grow.
The mastermind of the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been named Chief Creative Officer, Marvel in addition to being president of Marvel Studios, Variety has learned. He will now be responsible for the overall creative direction of Marvel’s storytelling across mediums, including publishing, film, TV, and animation. Marvel Television and Marvel Family Entertainment will be moving under the Marvel Studios banner. Feige continues to report to Walt Disney Studios co-chairman and chief creative officer Alan Horn and co-chairman Alan Bergman.
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Dan Buckley will remain president of Marvel Entertainment. He will continue to oversee publishing both creative and editorial, reporting to Feige. Buckley will also oversee publishing operations, sales, creative services, games, licensing and events, reporting in those areas to Marvel Entertainment chairman Ike Perlmutter.
Joe Quesada will continue as executive vice president, creative director for Marvel Entertainment, reporting to Buckley. Marvel Entertainment’s vice president of content and character development Sana Amanat, editor in chief and head of global editorial CB Cebulski, and Stephen Wacker, vice president of creative and content development, will continue in their roles reporting to Buckley.
According to an individual with knowledge of the situation, no decisions have been made regarding either current projects or those in development. Feige and his team are said to be evaluating all such projects on an individual basis going forward.
News of Feige’s new role comes around two weeks after Variety reported on a growing perception in the industry that Marvel Television under Jeph Loeb was slowly being phased out of live-action television projects. Feige is currently working on multiple shows for the nascent streamer Disney Plus centered on Marvel Cinematic Universe characters like Hawkeye, Falcon and Winter Soldier, as well as Loki, and Vision and Scarlet Witch.
Loeb’s division previously had numerous live-action shows on the air, including the six Marvel-Netflix shows — “Daredevil,” “Jessica Jones,” “Luke Cage,” “Iron Fist,” “The Defenders,” and “The Punisher.” All six of those have been canceled within the past year. Marvel’s longest-running live-action show, “Agents of SHIELD,” is preparing to end its run after seven seasons this spring on ABC. Other current Marvel TV-produced shows are “Runaways” at Hulu and “Cloak & Dagger” at Freeform, though the latter is still waiting on a Season 3 renewal after airing its second earlier this year.
Loeb’s team also had a live-action “Ghost Rider” series set up at Hulu, but that project was scrapped back in September. The main cast was recently announced for a “Helstrom” series that Loeb is producing at Hulu as well.
For the immediate future, it appears that Marvel Television will be focused on animation, as it had produced a number of animated series prior to venturing into live action. It is currently prepping four adult animated shows for Disney-owned Hulu: “Howard the Duck,” “MODOK,” “Hit-Monkey,” and “Tigra and Dazzler.” All four of those shows will then crossover in the event series “The Offenders” similar to the Marvel-Netflix strategy that led to “The Defenders.”
Deadline first reported Feige’s new title.
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