For 17 years, "Treasure Planet" was a pet project of Walt Disney Co. filmmakers Ron Clements and John Musker, who held firm to their vision, even though executive management, particularly studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg, had serious reservations about making the film. Clements' and Musker's persistence eventually carried the day after Katzenberg's forced exit, but, given the film's disappointing box office performance, it seems that Disney's leaders were correct for being naysayers. The picture pulled in a dismal five-day gross of $16.6 million, which was so bad that Disney took the unusual step of lowering its annual earnings by tens of millions of dollars. The film, which cost about $180 million to produce and market, became the biggest turkey in the history of Disney animation. Afterwards, there was a lot of finger pointing as to whether uninspired marketing, poor release timing, or non-compelling content was the most to blame. Due to a promotional deal with McDonald's, Disney was locked into the November 27th release date a year earlier, forcing the film to compete head on with family favorite "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" and even Disney's own "The Santa Clause 2." Disney claims that the picture did well with test audiences, but that "in our marketing maybe we should have stressed other elements to make it fun and exciting." Producer Roy Conli believes that the film will eventually become an audience favorite, noting "This has always been a movie driven by the passion of the artists, the directors and myself, and the team is hoping it has legs."