It’s a small world after all: New media constellations and Disney’s rising star – the global success of High School Musical

Abstract

The pan-platform distribution of children’s television has exacerbated the traditional ‘obligation or asset?’ dichotomy that has characterized the child audience in America, Australia and the UK. Current industrial constellations mean that a media conglomerate like the Disney Corporation can take advantage of a propitious ‘alignment of the planets’ of production, distribution and regulation to monetize programs through multiple windows. Disney can thus ensure cultural visibility and program profitability in a television landscape where fragmented audiences of all ages must be encouraged and enabled to consume the same product indefinitely. The made-for-TV movie High School Musical epitomizes Disney’s capacity to exploit the programs it both produces and distributes. Thus High School Musical’s global success can tell us a great deal about new settlements in children’s television.