House of Mouse is facing the future

Disney is an entertainment juggernaut still stuck in the 20th century.

It has billions of dollars tied up in live professional sports and cable TV through its ESPN operations, while viewers are cutting their cords. It has billions of dollars invested in theme parks, many with attractions that have gone from futuristic to retro. And it has billions of dollars tied to the box office at a time when moviegoers increasingly are movie streamers.

The company reports its latest quarterly financial results on Tuesday in the week ahead. It was a quarter that saw Disney open two new attractions at its theme parks in the U.S. The company continues leveraging its Star Wars acquisition of a few years ago by building franchise-themed “lands.” It is expanding its park in Hong Kong and just celebrated the first anniversary of its park in Shanghai.

At the theater, Disney’s Buena Vista studio is behind two of the year’s biggest box office moneymakers, “Beauty the Beast” and “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.” Most of those ticket sales happened in the past quarter. The films might be the only bright spots in an otherwise challenging summer environment. Total box office receipts are down 2 percent compared to a year ago, according to data from Box Office Mojo.

Disney’s media networks (ABC, ESPN, Disney Channel, etc.) represent the bulk of its profits, but theme parks and movies are where the growth has been. Those two segments saw profits jump 20 percent and 21 percent respectively compared to a year ago in the quarter that ended in April. That’s why investors will want to pay attention to these businesses.

The traditional television business, meanwhile, has been weak. ESPN is saddled with high-cost contracts for sports programming like the NFL’s “Monday Night Football.” Its reliance on getting about $9

per month from cable TV subscribers continues to be threatened by streaming services and a la cart cable TV packages. Since the days of “Steamboat Willy,” the first animated film with music and sound effects synced up to the images, Disney has been a trailblazer in entertainment. That history, though, hasn’t made it immune from the future. ABOUT THE WRITER

Financial journalist Tom Hudson hosts “The Sunshine Economy” on WLRN-FM in Miami, where he is the vice president of news.