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.
For those of a certain age who like to think that they’re still young — and who doesn’t? — it is sobering to realize that when Michael Ovitz bowed out of the agency business in 1995, neither Tom Holland nor Zendaya had even been born. People who weren’t around in those days can’t begin to appreciate the fear that Ovitz inspired in Hollywood. He wielded the kind of power that no agent has mustered since and no agent ever will again. How the times and the town have changed. One thing has remained constant in all the years since Ovitz left the building: Three then-young men who had emerged as future leaders of CAA well before Ovitz departed are still at the helm. Perhaps in spite of himself, Ovitz nailed…
Casey Wasserman The mogul’s deal to acquire Brillstein Entertainment Partners gives his namesake company a foothold in production and major new management clients, including Brad Pitt. Max Borenstein HBO pulls the plug on the Winning Time co-creator’s Lakers drama after a sevenepisode season two that didn’t make enough of a dent in viewership at Max. Olivia Rodrigo The artist’s second album, Guts, tops the Billboard 200 chart with the equivalent of nearly 200 million streams of its 12 songs, per Luminate data. Kenneth Branagh A Haunting in Venice, the third whodunit film in his Agatha Christie series, can’t conjure box office magic in its opening weekend with a $14.2 million bow. Showbiz Stocks $105.53 (+4.1%) TKO GROUP (TKO) The newly formed UFC and WWE owner saw its stock price pop…
Walt Disney’s new carriage agreement with cable giant Charter Communications is widely seen as a game-changer for the pay TV and streaming sectors, creating a new blueprint for how such deals are structured. Analysts and industry sources point to two key pieces of the deal that will likely be felt: ad-supported streaming in the bundle, and a “resizing” of the linear TV business. It’s a deal that NBCUniversal (which owns Peacock), Paramount (which owns Paramount+) and Warner Bros. Discovery (which owns Max) are surely looking at closely given it is widely expected to impact their future carriage deals. Mark Lazarus, the chairman of NBCUniversal Media group, acknowledged as much at the IMG Summit outside London on Sept. 14. In an interview with Endeavor president and COO Mark Shapiro, Lazarus noted…
One hundred years ago, in August 1923, the Green Bay Packers football club was formed in a public stock sale. The Packers sold 1,000 shares at $5 apiece, raising $5,000 (about $90,000 today, adjusted for inflation). The team has held five stock sales since then, in 1935, 1950, 1997, 2011 and 2021, but despite raising tens of millions of dollars, the Packers’ unusual structure has a big asterisk: The team is a publicly owned nonprofit corporation, and the stock? It cannot be resold, traded or returned to the team. While the Packers paved the way for the public to own a piece of a sports team (even if there isn’t much they can do with that ownership), in recent decades sports has mostly remained an investment for the ultrarich. With…
Jordan Firstman is sitting on a couch in a sterile corporate office after a photo shoot, wearing just a pink beach towel and cowboy boots, talking about recreational drugs. The juxtaposition is both funny and an apt metaphor for his career path. He spent eight years working in the writers rooms of irreverent comedies like Search Party, Big Mouth and The Other Two before falling into internet fame when his Instagram impressions went viral during the pandemic. Now, after two years of catering to followers he felt were increasingly interested in more of the same content — “No one gave a fuck about anything [that] wasn’t banana bread,” he says in reference to a clip where he pretends to be the publicist for the treat — he’s pivoting to something…
I call it the new Larchmont. It’s rocking,” says Louis Eafalla, who has been operating his Village Heights gift shop in Larchmont Village for 17 years. “It’s really a shopping street again.” The area — which features more than 50 stores and restaurants packed along Larchmont Boulevard between Beverly Boulevard and First Street — was established in 1921, and after taking a beating during COVID, has returned to become one of L.A.’s hottest neighborhoods. Levain Bakery, Clark Street Bakery and Faherty Brand have opened shops this year, with upcoming outposts for Sweet Lady Jane, Terroni, Suá Kitchen and Superette and Jon and Vinny’s Cookbook Market joining a mix of longtime mom-and-pops. Levain has been a particular crowd-drawer, according to many in the neighborhood, with the NYC-founded brand’s first L.A. location…
