Starz’s Pay-1 Rates Breakdown: What Starz Paid for a Decade of Sony Films

Starz once held one of the most valuable licensing agreements in pay television, locking in exclusive Pay-1 rights to Sony Pictures’ theatrical releases. But that era is over. Netflix and Disney now divide those rights, and Starz has been left with in-house content and post-Pay-1 windows.

As subscriber growth stagnates and competition intensifies, this transition reveals a deeper story of diminished bargaining power, declining content appeal, and a strategic pivot that may prove too little, too late.

FilmTake’s STARZ Pay-1 Film Rate Report provides exclusive insights into the actual licensing terms between Sony and Starz, including per-picture rates, bonus payments, and classification models that governed nearly a decade of releases.

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The Rise and Fade of Starz’s Film Power

When Lionsgate acquired Starz for $4.4 billion in 2016, the deal was sold as a content-to-platform marriage that would deliver scale and synergy. What followed was a rocky integration, executive turnover, and a years-long saga of anonymous leaks and aborted spin-off plans. As reported back in 2019, Lionsgate’s financial engineering masked deeper creative and strategic conflicts over the direction of Starz.

At its peak, Starz was a top-tier Pay-1 destination. The Sony deal, renewed and amended multiple times between 2005 and 2021, granted Starz exclusive 18-month exhibition rights for up to 300 linear airings of each qualifying Sony title.

The Pay-1 license agreement also included second-window rights years later. But from 2013 onward, Starz grew skeptical about the value it was getting. While Sony hiked rates by 35% twice over the contract term, many of the qualifying titles underperformed, with roughly half of them grossing under $10 million at the domestic box office.

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What Starz Paid for Sony’s Films

FilmTake’s STARZ Pay-1 Film Rate Report offers rare insight into how one of the most consequential licensing arrangements in premium television was structured. Rather than presenting general market estimates, the report draws directly from the licensing agreement between Starz and Sony, revealing how major studio films were priced, classified, and licensed over nine years.

The report explains how theatrical performance informed tiered pricing using structured rate cards, with films sorted into multiple categories based on box office results and distributor labels. It details how subscriber growth influenced additional payouts and how bonus payments were structured to account for performance over time.

Beyond raw numbers, the report outlines the deal architecture, such as exhibition caps, exclusivity terms, and the triggers for subscriber-on-demand fees. For professionals involved in licensing, finance, or valuation, it offers a comprehensive view into how a top-tier Pay-1 agreement actually functions in practice. If you’ve ever wondered what these deals look like behind closed doors, this is your chance to find out.

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What STARZ Pays for Films: Uncovering a Decade of Pay-1 Licensing Economics

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After Sony: A Shrinking Content Portfolio

Since parting ways with Sony in 2021, Starz has cobbled together a patchwork of in-house and post-Pay-1 deals. It now relies on Lionsgate and Summit releases for Pay-1 rights, Universal titles in a post-Pay-1 window, and expiring library deals with Disney, Warner Bros., and Paramount.

Starz lost more than just blockbuster access; it lost leverage. Sony’s theatrical slate included titles like “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” “The Equalizer 2,” and “Venom,” which were top performers even during lockdown years. Now, Starz must promote Lionsgate’s lesser-known theatrical output, many of which would not have qualified under Sony’s previous licensing criteria.

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A Deal That Outpaced Its Value

When the original Pay-1 Output Agreement was inked between Starz and Sony, stand-alone streaming was just beginning to gain traction, the theatrical market was at record highs, and Sony was riding the success of the James Bond blockbuster “Skyfall.”

From the outset, Sony aggressively raised license fees—by 35% for the 2014–2016 period and another 35% for the 2013–2021 extension. Yet during the first seven years of the deal, Sony landed only three films in the annual Top 10 box office rankings. Starz, paying increasingly steep rates, began to question the value it was receiving.

Roughly half of Sony’s output under the agreement earned less than $10 million at the domestic box office, with many titles coming from Sony Pictures Classics rather than its main theatrical slate. Ironically, just as Starz shifted to in-house Lionsgate titles, Sony’s performance improved—doubling its Top 10 appearances in 2020 and 2021 compared to the prior seven years combined.

By 2022, Netflix and Disney secured sequential Pay-1 deals for Sony’s slate through 2026. Disney, in particular, now has the flexibility to distribute Sony films across Disney+, Hulu, and its linear TV networks, including ABC, FX, and Freeform. Starz, in contrast, lost access to a varied pipeline of theatrical hits just as the value of Pay-1 exclusivity surged.

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Starz Subscriber Growth Has Stalled

According to public disclosures, Starz reported 26.6 million global subscribers in 2021, including 18 million in the U.S. and Canada. That number fell to 24.5 million in 2023, with U.S. growth stagnating and international expansion stalling under the rebranded “Lionsgate+” banner. Starz recently entered a bundling deal with Amazon’s MGM+ in a last-ditch effort to stabilize streaming revenue.

But without a steady pipeline of exclusive Pay-1 titles, Starz is leaning more heavily on episodic programming to retain subscribers. Franchises like “Power” and “Outlander” continue to perform, but the platform has not launched a breakout hit in years.

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Discover What a Pay-1 Deal Is Worth

As more studios hold back content for their own streaming platforms and others fragment rights across tiers and regions, understanding the mechanics of Pay-1 licensing is more essential than ever. The STARZ Pay-1 Film Rate Report offers:

• Full rate card tables for all Sony titles licensed to Starz from 2013 to 2021
• Definitions and classifications of “A,” “B,” and SPC titles
• Case studies on “Venom,” “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” and “The Equalizer 2”
• Annual bonus schedules and SOD fee triggers
• Analysis of declining box office performance vs. rising license fees

Whether you’re valuing a film library, negotiating distribution, or building financial models, this 22-page report will give you the clarity and confidence you won’t find anywhere else.

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FilmTake Away: From Licensing Muscle to Managed Decline

Starz once paid top dollar for studio hits and box office bets. But as content costs soared and returns diminished, it traded flexibility for control by staying in-house. The result? A service with fewer must-see movies, fewer new subscribers, and diminished influence in an increasingly crowded field.

Download the STARZ Pay-1 Film Rate Report to see precisely what Starz paid, and what those deals look like when the curtain is pulled back.

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