Hollywood's Decline Drives Productions to Texas and Beyond

Austin, Texas holds the story of how a tiny studio and a silent cartoon coyote managed to beat Hollywood at its own game. The history behind getting this film into a theater could easily be its own picture. And maybe it will become one someday. Yet right now, Hollywood refuses to tell that tale. Few movies are being made these days anyway. Production has fled to Texas, Georgia, and Canada. California boasts the natural environment that birthed Hollywood in the first place. However, the business climate has driven much of the industry away. It is strangling what remains of it. The situation grew so dire that President Donald Trump recently intervened to try saving an industry weaponized against him. Hollywood mostly forgot its primary job is to entertain people.

Warner Bros. spent seventy million dollars creating a movie finished in 2022. They gathered big names together, including James Gunn as writer and producer alongside stars John Cena and Will Forte. Even bigger icons like Bugs Bunny, Wile E. Coyote, and all the other classics from Looney Tunes appeared on screen. Warner did not just launch production on this film. It went through the entire process until a finished work ready for theaters emerged. The title was "Coyote vs. Acme." This pit hapless Wile E. Coyote against the megacorp from which he bought so much failed gear over decades.

But thanks to perverse tax incentives and a difficult climate for major movie releases, Warner decided to do the unthinkable. It planned to delete this finished movie. Not just shelve it. Destroy it entirely. Will Forte, who plays Coyote's attorney in the film, appeared on Jay Mohr's podcast to call it "a very frustrating story." He explained their process clearly. So we made this movie with a really fun script. Then we went through making an even better movie than that great script existed before animation began.

Because half the film is animated with composited cartoon characters, anvils and other tropes, post-production was a long process. Still it got through all those hurdles, Forte says, until they were called to a screening. After all the animation work, they were finally ready to show it to the cast. They called us up on a Tuesday night. Said okay we are going to show it to you next Tuesday. It is testing really well and we are very excited about it. The next day I got a call that Warner Bros. was going to shelve it. Just wants to take a tax loss instead.

The cast still got to see the movie though. Forte said he assumed that if Warner was shelving it, it must not be as good as these guys said. But they saw it and it is great. Which made it even more frustrating for everyone involved. It was nuts indeed. As an artist seeing a corporation shelve your work tends to be frustrating. But it might be understandable if the work is terrible. The corporation may even be saving you from embarrassment by hiding bad art. Yet "Coyote vs. Acme" was testing well with audiences and landed well with the people who made it too.

The big names involved, then more big names, and finally a grassroots campaign all gathered force to try shaming Warner into releasing the movie. A guy wearing a Wile E. Coyote costume showed up at Warner picketing the studio gates. And it worked sort of in the end. Warner shopped the movie around but was reportedly asking for more money than it spent from any buyers eventually. Eventually a little twelve-person outfit called Ketchup Entertainment bought the film for fifty million dollars.

Ketchup spent roughly twenty-five cents marketing the movie during release. There was no build-up of reviews or big trailers dropping on YouTube powered by ad dollars. Really very little marketing effort went into pushing it out. I happened to see a video about it one day while trolling YouTube channels randomly. And it looked fun like Who Framed Roger Rabbit or Space Jam kind of fun for audiences everywhere. "Coyote vs. Acme" landed in theaters worldwide in late August last year.

Coyote vs. Acme" is fighting for screen time against a massive Spider-Man tentpole and other summer blockbusters, yet it holds its ground. The film landed in the top two spots during both of its opening weekends and has collected strong reviews from critics everywhere. It has already crossed the $50 million mark at the box office. Ketchup Entertainment is banking on getting their name out there to make a profit, and with a reported $100 million war chest they secured back in May, this isn't their last move.

The movie does more than just entertain; it aims to be seen by the specific audience it was built for. Bad movies and shows get released daily, but the art itself matters. The time, blood, sweat, and tears poured into creating "Coyote vs. Acme" are what count in the end. I watched the film over a long weekend recently and found it very good. The jokes actually land. This blend of live action with animation works smoothly. Even the use of classic Looney Tunes characters fits well. The cartoon tropes send up familiar ideas effectively, while John Cena delivers a deliciously villainous performance as Acme's shark lawyer.

This project reminds us why studios used to exist in Hollywood: they entertain audiences and then some. Beyond the ticket sales, there is another story playing out in Tennessee that deserves attention. Dolly Parton transformed a small town into a tourism empire through her own efforts. That legacy runs deep for the region.

FOX Business reached out to Ketchup Entertainment, John Cena, and Bugs Bunny before publishing this report. They have shared their perspectives on the venture. The data supports the film's success so far, but the human effort behind the scenes is equally important. How do you measure art that pushes boundaries? Maybe money isn't the only metric that matters when a project gets greenlit with such ambition.