The all-new Hollywood Reporter offers unprecedented access to the people, studios, networks and agencies that create the magic in Hollywood. Published weekly, the oversized format includes exceptional photography and rich features.
Mike Verdu Netflix expands into video games with the hire of the former Facebook and Electronic Arts executive, who was named vp game development. Jimmy Pitaro The ESPN chief says “we have much more work to do” on diversity efforts as a “complicated” personnel dispute involving key on-air NBA reporters goes public. Michael Waldron & Kate Herron The Loki creator and director led the Disney+ series to the biggest Marvel show premiere on Nielsen’s streaming chart, with 731 million minutes viewed. Frank Miller & Tom Wheeler After one season, Netflix cancels Cursed, the fantasy drama based on the co-creators’ graphic novel series reimagining the King Arthur legend. Showbiz Stocks $3,681.68 (+1.2%) AMAZON (AMZN) No Jeff Bezos? No problem. With new CEO Andy Jassy at the helm, and with increased antitrust…
Marvel fans were flying high with the release of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, as the Disney+ series rose to top Nielsen’s closely watched streaming chart with 855 million minutes viewed during the April 12-18 frame. Yet one person fans were surprised to learn wasn’t watching was Ed Brubaker. The comic book writer, who co-created the Winter Soldier character and whose work helped inspire $1 billion grossers like 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, made waves with a widely circulated interview in which he expressed dissatisfaction with his Winter Soldier pay. “I have made more on SAG residuals than I have made on creating the character,” Brubaker told Kevin Smith on the Fatman Beyond podcast, referencing his cameo in Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014). In May, Ta-Nehisi Coates, whose…
Global streaming video revenue could soar 60 percent to $94 billion by 2025, but a theatrical box office recovery may not hit pre-pandemic levels for another three years. Those are among the predictions from accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers’ annual look at the media and entertainment landscape on July 12. By 2025, streaming growth is expected to be powered by subscriptions to services like Netflix or Disney+, with revenue totaling more than $81 billion globally, while $13 billion may be from transactional video-on-demand revenue. In the U.S., total 2020 media and entertainment industry revenue fell 4.5 percent, from $717 billion to $685 billion, but the sector is expected to consistently grow to reach $855 billion in 2025 after hitting nearly $724 billion in 2021. When it comes to global advertising revenue, dollars…
Perception is everything. A day after The Walt Disney Co. announced that Marvel Studios’ Scarlett Johansson starring Black Widow debuted to $218.8 million — including $60 million from Disney+ Premier Access and $158.8 million in global box office — the company’s stock jumped 4 percent July 12 while theater stocks dipped across the board. Disney’s ability to boast a $200 million-plus worldwide opening, without relying solely on box office, certainly pleased investors, but traditional Hollywood studios and cinema owners are less than enthusiastic about trumpeting streaming success. Until now, no traditional studio has publicly shared viewership numbers for any of the multitude of their movies that are playing in homes earlier than ever because of COVID-19. The Black Widow reveal could mark a paradigm shift. Sources say Disney is likely…
Will your favorite Netflix show be interrupted with screeching noises and then urgent news from the nation’s leaders sometime in the future? That’s a possibility Congress could soon hear about when the FCC reports on the feasibility of making streaming services adopt the Emergency Alert System. In the 1960s, a predecessor system to the EAS was established to warn Americans to get into bomb shelters in the event of a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. Later, all broadcast stations and cable and satellite operators were required to install and maintain the system. These days, the EAS has shown rust. Notably, in January 2018, citizens of Hawaii woke up to the ominous alarm of a ballistic missile threat that proved to be a mistake. In the wake of this errant…
The story of how a Native American film director, an iconic actor and the writer of Game of Thrones teamed for an AMC series based on the Dark Wind novels goes back decades. In 1979, Thrones author George R.R. Martin moved to New Mexico and met Dark Wind writer Tony Hillerman, who hosted a monthly luncheon at the Albuquerque Press Club for writers. The authors became friends, and Martin got hooked on Hillerman’s series, which follows a pair of New Mexican Navajo police detectives, Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee, from opposing backgrounds. Fast forward to 1988. Robert Redford discovered the Leaphorn/Chee novels and picked up rights with the intention of making a series of films. Yet Redford struggled to get a major studio on board. “Getting an all-Native American cast…
