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On April 3, HBO toasts the final season of Game of Thrones with a splashy Radio City Music Hall premiere in New York. But quite a few staffers are feeling bittersweet as they glad-hand their way through the show’s victory lap. Come mid-May the network’s longtime cash cow, likely the most popular TV series in the world, airs its last original episode — setting the stage for heightened pressure to milk Thrones IP for new parent company AT&T, which acquired Time Warner assets for $85 billion. “Game of Thrones has become the cornerstone of HBO,” says Craig Moffett, telecom analyst and founding partner at firm MoffettNathanson. “Losing it was always going to be painful — even more so now that they’re losing a big chunk of their management ranks.” Moffett…
Kevin Feige The Marvel Studios chief’s Captain Marvel soars past $1 billion at the global box office as presales for Avengers: Endgame over-whelm ticketing websites. Scott M. Gimple AMC’s The Walking Dead content chief sees the season nine finale of the flagship show sink to 5 million viewers, the smallest finale in the drama’s history. Mötley Crüe The ’80s rockers score their first top 10 album in more than a decade as the soundtrack to the Netflix biopic The Dirt enters at No. 10 on the Billboard 200. David Blaine New York police say there’s an active investigation into the TV illusionist after two women accuse him of sexual assault (which he denies). Showbiz Stocks $33.14 (+8%) DISH NETWORK (DISH) The satellite TV company ends a blackout of Univision Communications…
Thrones and HBO: A Global Subscriber March The premium network’s worldwide subs have grown by nearly 50 million over the course of the decade Game of Thrones has aired How Much Does GoT Matter to HBO? Have you ever subscribed to a streaming service exclusively to watch a certain show? TV Bulks Up on Genre Franchises Streamers, networks mine hits for ever more spinoffs in development…
We don’t want to be running books,” said AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson. “That’s not our gig.” He was speaking at the NBA All-Star Tech Summit in February. He’s not the only executive who has felt compelled to clarify his company’s position on sports betting in the wake of the Supreme Court decision on May 14 to lift a federal ban. “We don’t see ourselves taking bets,” ESPN executive vp Justin Connolly tells THR. “That’s not our territory.” But for media giants like ESPN and Turner, the potential is sizable — gambling is an opportunity to drive engagement and tune-in to the games for which these companies pay billions. Turner Sports’ Bleacher Report launched its betting vertical in 2018; the app stream has grown three times faster than users of the…
Jussie Smollett managed to avoid a trial after Chicago prosecutors dropped charges against him March 26 for allegedly lying to police about a hate crime — but the actor’s future on Fox’s Empire is far from certain. The network’s upfronts are scheduled for May 13, and executives likely will want to resolve the actor’s role on the hit show well before then. Executives in charge of making the decision don’t appear to be wasting any time. “I’m sure they’re scouring ratings and online feedback,” a source close to the show tells THR, referring to Empire’s executive producers. “What I’ve heard is that fans and viewers like him, they want him, they want his character in the show.” Failure by Fox to decide Smollett’s Empire fate before the upfronts could potentially…
On March 26, after two years of charged debate, the European Parliament passed the contentious new Copyright Directive — legislation aimed at updating the law for the internet age. The directive shifts responsibility for infringement to online platforms — such as the Mark Zuckerberg-led Facebook and YouTube, run by CEO Susan Wojcicki — which now will be required to make their “best efforts” to identify and to either license copyright-protected material or to block it from being shared on their sites. It also requires platforms to be transparent about revenue earned from individual creative works and to provide rights holders with “fair remuneration” for their films, music and TV series. The European Council, the EU’s executive body, is expected to pass the Copyright Directive in April, after which individual countries…
