Disney's Snow White Flop Explained: How Much Money The Studio Lost

In 2016, writer, director, and actor Jon Favreau picked up a slightly dormant Disney tradition and made a live-action version of "The Jungle Book" that mixed CGI with live performance. Unfortunately for the entertainment industry, this movie made so much money that Disney decided the best course of action was to take all of their animated classics — including "The Lion King," "Aladdin," "Beauty and the Beast," and "The Little Mermaid," just to name a few — and turn them into live-action hybrid movies for new audiences.

This move netted the House of Mouse quite a lot of money — and, to be absolutely fair, some of these remakes were pretty fun ("Maleficent" is solid, and Kenneth Branagh's take on "Cinderella" is actually quite good). As time went by, though, enthusiasm for these live-action remakes started waning, and to make matters worse, toxic parts of the Disney fandom launched completely out-of-pocket attacks against stars of color like Halle Bailey, who led the "Little Mermaid" reboot as Ariel (and, not for nothing, did a phenomenal job). By the time we got to the "Snow White" remake starring Rachel Zegler, the writing was, unfortunately, on the wall; there was plenty of outcry that an actress of Colombian descent would play the character, and actors like Peter Dinklage made some good points about how the movie would handle dwarves. Then, the movie came out, and it lost so much money.

When all is said and done, Deadline reported that "Snow White" — starring Zegler and Gal Gadot and directed by Marc Webb — lost $115 million, and the film's BoxOfficeMojo numbers basically confirm that report. So what happened here? Was it controversy stirred up by Zegler that kept "Snow White" from succeeding? Were audiences simply tired of watching beloved Disney animated movies get remade with jarring CGI effects? Was the movie even good? Briefly and in order: not really, probably, and no.

On March 25, 2025, Variety ran a piece about precisely why Marc Webb and Disney's ambitious "Snow White" remake bombed at the box office, and it put the blame squarely on the shoulders of the film's lead actress Rachel Zegler. Zegler, who rose to fame and acclaim thanks to her starring role as Maria in Steven Spielberg's (totally underrated) 2021 remake of "West Side Story" and has also led movies like "Shazam! Fury of the Gods" and "The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," is a preternaturally talented singer and actress. Unfortunately, she also became the scapegoat for "Snow White."

The Variety piece kicks off by recounting that Zegler wrote a post on the social media platform X after the first teaser trailer for "Snow White" dropped where she thanked fans for their support and concluded her overall message with, "and always remember, free palestine." The article goes on to present this as an inciting incident that pushed the film's producer Marc Platt to fly across the country and meet with Zegler to urge her to remove the post in the wake of the open conflict that's been occurring in Gaza since Hamas forces attacked Israel on October 7, 2023. (Zegler reportedly refused.) An insider told Variety of Zegler's actions — actions that included her correctly noting that the original story of "Snow White" might be a bit outdated — Zegler simply didn't know what she was doing, and framed it as a selfish act. "She didn't understand the repercussions of her actions as far as what that meant for the film, for Gal [Gadot], for anyone," the insider said after also sharing that Gadot, who plays the evil queen in the film, needed extra security detail.

You can read the Variety piece for yourself, but the clear intention here is to paint a picture that Zegler's political activism tanked the movie (she also posted an angry and despondent message after the 2024 United States election, in which Donald Trump was re-elected). So does this argument hold water? Not entirely, no. The "Snow White" remake failed for a variety of reasons, and honestly, Zegler isn't one of them!

When Looper's own Cynthia Vinney reviewed "Snow White" just ahead of its March 21 release, Vinney gave the film a 6 out of 10 and called it "half of a good movie," but there was one aspect she definitively praised. Calling Rachel Zegler "fantastic as Snow White," Vinney continues, "Zegler not only has a gorgeous voice, but makes the role of Snow White her own, holding the screen with her formidable charm and compassionate presence."

This falls nicely in line with the film's official Rotten Tomatoes critical consensus, which declares, "'Snow White' is hardly a grumpy time at the movies thanks to Rachel Zegler's luminous star turn, but its bashful treatment of the source material along with some dopey stylistic choices won't make everyone happy, either." This (correctly) indicates that the film, which earned a bleak 40% critical rating on the review aggregator, mostly received praise for Zegler's performance ... and if you've seen her in her two best films, "West Side Story" and "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," you know that this young actress is an absolute tour-de-force onscreen. Maybe — just maybe — the "Snow White" movie didn't fail for complex political reasons. Maybe it failed because it wasn't very well made overall, people are sick of remakes and reboots, and nobody really wanted to see it in the first place.

It's frustrating that Hollywood decided Zegler was to blame for this fiasco, but stars like Pedro Pascal ultimately came to her defense, and over at Looper's sister site /Film, writer BJ Colangelo urged people to, for lack of a better term, stop being weird about this talented performer. Zegler is phenomenally talented; the "Snow White" movie isn't very good, and nobody asked for it. Sometimes, you can just take things at face value ... and the reason that "Snow White" was a major box-office bomb is one of them.