Does the second part move to 2024?

LOS ANGELES – Warner Bros. has a sandworm-sized dilemma on its hands: keeping the fall release date for its highly anticipated “Dune: Part Two” and risking its star-studded cast not promoting it, or beat it next year and you’ll potentially lose a dominant race on lucrative premium movie screens.

As two strikes occur in Hollywood, writers and movie stars are not allowed to promote their projects due to strike rules. The longer the work stoppages drag on, the more likely it is that studios will delay releases, as production shutdowns clog the movie release pipeline.

Already, a handful of titles, including Ethan Coen’s “Drive Away Dolls,” the sequel to “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” and the Emma Stone-directed “Poor Things,” have been moved to later dates due to the work stoppage. “Dune: Part Two,” a sci-fi epic based on Frank Herbert’s seminal novel, might end up being the biggest title to move. There has been speculation that the sequel would leave its place on November 3 since the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists went on strike last month.

After the surprise success of “Barbie,” and with growing doubts about December’s “Aquaman: The Lost Kingdom,” “Dune: Part Two” would be a major 2023 release for Warner Bros. Its predecessor excelled at the box office during the pandemic despite being released day and date on the streaming service HBO Max (now just called Max). It racked up 10 Academy Award nominations and took home six trophies.

With pandemic restrictions lifted in movie theaters, “Dune: Part Two” is expected to surpass the nearly $400 million that the previous film racked up at the global box office in 2021 on a reported budget of $165 million.

“As one of the biggest and most anticipated films of the important and prestigious holiday season, ‘Dune: Part Two’ is one of the jewels in the Warner Bros. crown.’ year-end lineup and has a lot on its film shoulders,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore.

Warner Bros. did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

Although the Writers Guild of America has returned to the negotiating table with the producers, negotiations are moving slowly.

Meanwhile, the producers have not contacted the other union on strike, SAG-AFTRA, to resume talks. SAG-AFTRA has also pledged not to grant tentative deals to any WGA-covered productions produced in the US, meaning these projects cannot begin or continue filming or be promoted by active members of the guild if they are released.

There is a genuine fear that the labor struggle will also drag on.

“I think it’s going to continue into next year,” said Steven Schiffman, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University and a former executive at National Geographic. “I think it’s going to come down to a really painful process.”

The inability for actors to promote movie releases is one of the main obstacles facing “Dune: Part Two.”

Typically, studios will begin marketing their movies in earnest, beyond trailers and posters, in the six to eight weeks before a movie is released. These efforts often include late-night talk show appearances by cast members, taped interviews and promotional tours, as well as international promotional tours.

If SAG-AFTRA doesn’t reach an agreement by mid-September, the sequel’s marketing campaign won’t be able to use its star-studded ensemble to promote the film.

Joining industry veterans Christopher Walken, Stellan Skarsgard, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, Dave Bautista and Jason Momoa, the film features four of Hollywood’s hottest young stars.

Zendaya, Timothee Chalamet, Florence Pugh, and Austin Butler together have over 200 million followers on Instagram and are trending faces on TikTok, Twitter, and other social media platforms.

“Without that, they’re depriving a lot of Gen Z from going to see that movie,” said Alicia Reese, vice president of equity research at Wedbush Securities.

He noted that older moviegoers who are fans of the book and saw the first “Dune” will appear in theaters, but younger audiences might miss out on the film without the promotion of these stars.

“To miss that, it’s damaging,” Reese said, “but is it damaging enough not to show the movie? Because if they move it, they risk losing that really prime IMAX spot.”

Premium format auditoriums like IMAX, Dolby Cinema and ScreenX are becoming increasingly important for blockbuster features like recent hits “Avatar: The Way of Water” and “Oppenheimer.” After the pandemic, audiences have been more demanding about the movies they leave home to see and have opted more for projections with better image and sound quality, even if the price is higher.

In 2022, 15% of all domestic tickets sold were for premium screenings, with an average cost of $15.92, according to data from EntTelligence. A standard ticket costs an average of $11.29.

If “Dune: Part Two” moves into next year, it risks not finding a weekend, or multiple weekends, where it will be able to capture a significant chunk of premium screens or not be able to retain them for several weeks of its run.

Also, if you stick with your current date, other movies could move and you could find yourself with limited competition and the ability to grab more audience attention.

“Every studio with a movie on the schedule is faced with how to deal with similar dilemmas,” Dergarabedian said.

Still to come in 2023 are Disney and “The Wonders” of Marvel, lionsgate’s “The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes,” Disney Animation’s “Wish.” Apple TV+ is “Napoleon”. Warner Bros. also has other great titles: “Wonka,” the sequel to “Aquaman,” and “The Color Purple.”

“There are practical arguments in favor of ‘Dune: Part Two’ both moving and staying,” said Shawn Robbins, chief analyst at BoxOffice.com. “For the health of the industry in general, I think the scales are still tipping in favor of staying in November.”

While Universal’s “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” have pumped nearly $1 billion into domestic box office coffers in the past month, there are few blockbuster releases scheduled for the rest of the year, the sequel to “Dune” among they.

A depleted fourth-quarter movie slate could hurt exhibition partners like AMC, Cinemark and Regal which are heavily dependent on new content.

Moving “Dune: Part Two” could possibly cause other studios to delay big releases until next year, according to Robbins.

“Frankly, the second half of this year doesn’t need any more challenges to try to keep up with the strong spring and summer that we’ve seen at the box office,” he said.

Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC.