Predecessor unit The studio's predecessor (and the modern-day the Walt Disney Company's as a whole) was founded as the
Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, by filmmaker
Walt Disney and his business partner and brother,
Roy, in 1923. The creation of
Mickey Mouse and subsequent short films and merchandise generated revenue for the studio, which was renamed as
The Walt Disney Studio at the Hyperion Studio in 1926. In 1929, it was renamed again to
Walt Disney Productions. The studio's streak of success continued in the 1930s, culminating with the 1937 release of the first feature-length animated film,
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which becomes a huge financial success. With the profits from
Snow White, Walt relocated to
a third studio in
Burbank, California. In the 1940s, Disney began experimenting with full-length live-action films, with the introduction of hybrid live action-animated films such as
The Reluctant Dragon (1941) and
Song of the South (1946). That same decade, the studio began producing nature documentaries with the release of
Seal Island (1948), the first of the
True-Life Adventures series and a subsequent
Academy Award winner for
Best Live-Action Short Film. Walt Disney Productions had its first fully live-action film in 1950 with the release of
Treasure Island, considered by Disney to be the official conception for what would eventually evolve into the modern-day Walt Disney Pictures. By 1953, the company ended their agreements with such third-party distributors as
RKO Radio Pictures and
United Artists and formed their own distribution company,
Buena Vista Distribution. By the 1950s, the company had purchased the rights to the work of
L. Frank Baum.
1980s–2000s The live-action division of Walt Disney Productions was incorporated as
Walt Disney Pictures on April 1, 1983, to diversify film subjects and expand audiences for their film releases. In April 1983, Richard Berger was hired by Disney CEO
Ron W. Miller as film president.
Touchstone Films was started by Miller in February 1984 as a label for the studio's PG-13 and R-rated films with an expected half of Disney's yearly 6-to-8-movie slate, which would be released under the label. That same year, newly named Disney CEO
Michael Eisner pushed out Berger, replacing him with Eisner's own film chief from
Paramount Pictures,
Jeffrey Katzenberg. and
Frank Wells from
Warner Bros. Pictures. Touchstone and
Hollywood Pictures were formed within that unit on February 15, 1984, and February 1, 1989, respectively. The
Touchstone Films banner was used by then-new Disney CEO
Michael Eisner in the 1984–1985 television season with the short-lived western,
Wildside. In the next season, Touchstone produced a hit in
The Golden Girls.
David Hoberman was promoted to president of production at Walt Disney Pictures in April 1988. In April 1994, Hoberman was promoted to president of motion picture production at Walt Disney Studios, and David Vogel was appointed as Walt Disney Pictures president. The following year, however, Hoberman resigned from the company and instead began a production deal with Disney and his newly formed production company,
Mandeville Films. Vogel was then promoted in 1998 to the head of Buena Vista Motion Pictures Group, the newly formed division that oversaw all live-action production within the Walt Disney Pictures, Touchstone, and Hollywood labels. The move was orchestrated by Walt Disney Studios chairman
Joe Roth, as an effort to scale back and consolidate the studio's film production. That same year,
Nina Jacobson became executive vice-president of live-action production for Buena Vista Motion Pictures Group. Jacobson remained under this title until May 1999, when Vogel resigned from the company, and Jacobson was appointed by Roth to the role of president of production. In 2006, Jacobson was fired by studio chairman
Dick Cook, and replaced by Oren Aviv, the head of marketing. In July 2007, Disney CEO
Bob Iger banned the depiction of
smoking and
tobacco products from Walt Disney Pictures films. After two films based on Disney theme park attractions, Walt Disney Pictures selected it as a source of a line of films starting with
The Country Bears (2002) and
The Haunted Mansion and
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (both 2003). The latter film—the first film produced by the studio to receive a
PG-13 rating—began
a film series that was followed by four sequels, with the franchise taking in more than $5.4 billion worldwide from 2003 to 2017. On January 12, 2010, Aviv stepped down as the studio's president of live-action production.
2010s–present In January 2010,
Sean Bailey was appointed the studio's president of live-action production, replacing Aviv. Concurrently, Disney was struggling with PG-13 tentpole films outside of the
Pirates of the Caribbean series, with films such as
John Carter (2012) and
The Lone Ranger (2013) becoming some of
the biggest box-office bombs of all time. However, the studio had found particular success with live-action fantasy adaptations of properties associated with their
animated films, which began with the commercial success of
Alice in Wonderland (2010), that became the second billion-dollar-grossing film in the studio's history. With the continued success of
Maleficent (2014) and
Cinderella (2015), the studio saw the potential in these fantasy adaptations and officiated
a trend of similar films, which followed with
The Jungle Book (2016) and
Beauty and the Beast (2017). In March 2015, Iger expanded the studio's smoking and tobacco prohibition to include all films released by the studio—including PG-13 rated films and below—unless such depictions are historically pertinent. Despite the acclaim and commercial success of several smaller-budgeted genre films throughout the 2010s, such as
The Muppets (2011),
Saving Mr. Banks (2013), and
Into the Woods (2014), Walt Disney Pictures shifted its production model entirely on tent-pole films as they had found that a majority of the smaller genre films were becoming financially unsustainable in the theatrical market. By July 2016, Disney had announced development of nearly eighteen films consisting of sequels to existing adaptations, origin stories and prequels. In 2017, the Walt Disney Company announced it was creating its own
streaming service platform. The new service, known as
Disney+, would feature original programming created by the company's vast array of film and television production studios, including Walt Disney Pictures. As part of this new distribution platform, Bailey and Horn confirmed that Walt Disney Pictures would renew development on smaller-budgeted genre films that the studio had previously stopped producing for the
theatrical exhibition market a few years prior. These films would be budgeted between $20 million and $60 million. In 2023, Walt Disney Pictures celebrated its
centennial alongside
Walt Disney Animation Studios and their corporate parent company as a whole. That same year,
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny marked the studio's first official co-production with Lucasfilm. On February 26, 2024, Disney announced a leadership change, with Bailey stepping down as president and replaced by David Greenbaum, who formerly co-led
Searchlight Pictures. Greenbaum leads Walt Disney Pictures and co-lead 20th Century Studios with current 20th Century president Steve Asbell. On February 19, 2025, Daria Cercek joined the studio as president of theatrical. == Logo ==