This only makes sense if you value "box office numbers" for their own sake which this signals very clearly that they do not. As the article points out it's not

This only makes sense if you value "box office numbers" for their own sake which this signals very clearly that they do not. As the article points out it's not the first time he's said he thinks his career has run its course, but there's also no reason to think he wasn't sincere any of those times. He knows he's famous and it will do very well without marketing. Why optimize a metric you don't care about? I don't find the cynical laziness explanation as convincing as the stated motivation tbh.