| | | | | | What's news: Spotify has hit 239m premium subscribers. LaKeith Stanfield will star in the adaptation of video game El Paso, Elsewhere. Paramount CEO Bob Bakish was paid $31.3m in 2023. Bluey episode "The Sign" racked up 10.4m views in its first week. Cannes has added three more films to its 2024 competition. — Abid Rahman
Do you have THR's next big story? Confidentially share tips with us at tips@thr.com. |
Webbys 2024: Taylor Tops Travis ►🏆 Tayvis domination 🏆 Taylor Swift has beaten Travis Kelce — at least in the competition for a Webby Award. The singer and football pro, who are romantically linked, were both vying for a Webby in the same category — best creator or influencer collaboration, features (social). Kelce, along with his brother Jason Kelce, won the People’s Voice Award (voted on by the public) for best co-hosts, features (podcasts) for their New Heights podcast. Kara Swisher, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Shannon Sharpe and Keke Palmer are among the recipients of this year's special achievement awards. The winners.
—"Fascist totalitarianism." Screenwriter and playwright David Mamet has revealed he is no fan of the entertainment industry’s efforts to drive greater diversity, equity and inclusion in its ranks. “DEI is garbage,” Mamet told the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books on Sunday during a session with Matt Brennan. Mamet, who has worked in Hollywood since the 1980s and is known for his trademark rapid-fire script dialogue, did not shy away from criticism during an informal conversation at USC’s Newman Recital Hall. The story.
—Canceled. Facing widespread unhappiness over its response to the Israel-Hamas war, the writers’ group PEN America has called off its annual awards ceremony. Dozens of nominees had dropped out of the event, which was to have taken place next week. PEN, a literary and free expression organization, hands out the $75,000 for the PEN/Jean Stein Award for best book. But with nine of the 10 Jean Stein finalists withdrawing, along with nominees in other categories, continuing with the ceremony at The Town Hall in Manhattan proved unworkable. The story.
—"I haven’t beat the disease, as it’s still within me and always will be." Céline Dion says she is hoping to “find a miracle” as she continues to battle with Stiff Person Syndrome. In a new interview, the legendary singer said "I hope that we’ll find a miracle, a way to cure it with scientific research, but for now I have to learn to live with it." Dion added that she's "chosen to work with all my body and soul, from head to toe, with a medical team." The story. |
Spotify Swings to Profit ►Sounds great. Audio streaming giant Spotify has reached 239m paying premium subscribers for Q1 2024, up from 236m in Q4 2023, which met analyst expectations. The company's Q1 revenue rose 20 percent to $3.84b. During the latest quarter, Spotify swung to pre-tax income of $185.4m, against a pre-tax loss of $74.5m in Q3 2023. Spotify also reported that it hit 615m monthly active users as of the end of Q1 2024, up 19 percent from 602m at the end of the Q4 2023. The results.
—Bob's burgher. Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish saw total compensation in 2023 of $31.3m, compared with $32.0m in 2022. The company filed its annual proxy statement Monday, disclosing the latest pay packages for the Paramount boss and other top executives. Bakish’s package in 2023 included a base salary of $3.1m, stock awards of $15.5m, $12.4m earned under the company’s annual performance-based incentive program, $121,824 related to a change in pension value and $100,196 in other compensation. The story.
—🤝 "Substantial" investment 🤝 Range Media has raised fresh cash in what it is calling a “growth capital” round meant to expand its business both domestically and abroad. The management and production firm, founded in 2020 by former CAA agent Peter Micelli and other former agents, says that it has completed an investment round with media mogul John Malone’s Liberty Global, TPG founder David Bonderman’s Wildcat Capital, and the family entertainment company Playground Productions. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The story.
—Big loss. Disney has lost one of its top streaming executives. Aaron LaBerge, the chief technology officer for Disney Entertainment and ESPN, will leave at the end of June to become the CTO of Penn Entertainment, the gambling company that is partnered with Disney on the ESPN Bet sports betting platform. According to a memo from Disney Entertainment chiefs Dana Walden and Alan Bergman, as well as ESPN chief Jimmy Pitaro, the move was a “personal decision,” and they are beginning to look for a new CTO, with Chris Lawson taking over in the interim. The story. |
Stewart Slams Media for Trump Trial Coverage ►"Are we going to follow this guy to court everything day? Are you trying to make this OJ? It’s not a chase. He’s commuting." The gloves came off on The Daily Show on Monday night, as host Jon Stewart excoriated the news media for its incredibly dramatic coverage of Donald Trump's New York criminal trial. Stewart highlighted some of the more ludicrous coverage seen on cable news, predominantly, since the trial started, including CNN’s Jake Tapper trying to hilariously analyze a “glowering” courtroom sketch of Trump. The recap.
—Crikey! "The Sign," the much-discussed special episode of Bluey is also the most watched episode of the show on Disney+. The April 14 installment of the beloved preschool series racked up 10.4m views worldwide on Disney+ in the week after its release, the streamer says. (The view count is the total viewing time divided by running time.) That’s the biggest tune-in for any Bluey episode — or that of any other Disney Junior show — on Disney+. The ratings.
—Going worldwide. Paramount Global is planning a new streaming channel for South Park fans to launch on the ad-based service Pluto TV in international markets. Studio execs note the expansion of the South Park universe on Pluto TV outside the U.S. does not represent new content, as it will instead make the existing animated series more widely available on the ad-based streaming platform. The story. |
Academy Updates Oscar Rules and Campaign Protocols ►Saving theaters. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' board of governors has announced updated awards rules and campaign promotional regulations — as well as changes to some of the special honors that are presented at the organization’s annual Governors Awards ceremony and its annual Scientific and Technical Awards ceremony. THR's executive awards editor Scott Feinberg runs through the major changes, that includes the Academy taking on a more prominent role in boosting movie theaters, becoming more hospitable to composers and asking writers to show their work. The rules.
—🎭 RZA's edge 🎭 Shameik Moore and Paris Jackson have grabbed lead roles in the drama One Spoon of Chocolate, which has started production in Atlanta. Rapper and filmmaker Robert Fitzgerald Diggs, better known as RZA, is directing from his own screenplay. The feature follows an ex-military convict leaving the city for a small town where he ends up finding love, danger and more trouble than he can handle. RZA made his directorial debut with 2012’s The Man With the Iron Fists and followed it up with 2017 rap and poetry drama Love Beats Rhymes. The story.
—🎭 Buzzy 🎭 The Book of Clarence star LaKeith Stanfield is teaming up with veteran producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura for El Paso, Elsewhere, an adaptation of the neo-noir vampire video game from publisher Strange Scaffold. Stanfield is in talks to star in the feature and will also produce along with di Bonaventura, who is known for his action movies such as the Transformers franchise. There is no writer or director, as the buzzy project is still being packaged in the hopes of finding a studio home. The story.
—🎭 Another new face 🎭 Tramell Tillman — the actor who broke out in popular Apple series Severance — has landed a role in the eighth Mission: Impossible film. Tillman will join fellow franchise newcomers like Katy O’Brian, Nick Offerman and Hannah Waddingham, along with Mission vets that include Henry Czerny, Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Pom Klementieff and Vanessa Kirby. Plot details (including what character Tillman will be playing) are being kept under wraps. The story.
—🎭 Die Wiedervereinigung 🎭 Diane Kruger is re-teaming with her In the Fade director Fatih Akin on the new German period drama Amrum, which has begun principal photography in Hamburg. The film follows a family living in a small village on Amrum Island in rural northern Germany in early 1945, in the final days of World War II. The story is based on the childhood memories of Akin’s In the Fade co-screenwriter, German author and director Hark Bohm. Bohm had initially planned to direct the film himself before handing the reins over to Akin. The story.
—🤝 Renewal 🤝 Paramount Pictures has renewed its first-look deal with Lindsey Anderson Beer and her production banner Lab Brew. In re-upping the deal, the studio has also picked up Here Comes the Dark, a supernatural thriller spec script by Shane and Carey Van Dyke, the duo who co-wrote the 2022 thriller Don’t Worry Darling. Anderson Beer and Lab Brew will produce. Paramount’s renewal is a vote of confidence in Anderson Beer, who wrote and made her feature directorial debut with the horror movie Pet Sematary: Bloodline for the studio last year. The story. |
For Coppola's Go-for-Broke Movies, All Roads Lead to Cannes ►Gambling once more. For THR, Brandeis American Studies Professor Thomas Doherty writes that as Francis Ford Coppola readies his self-funded epic Megalopolis for the Croisette, echoes of his Apocalypse Now journey to the Cannes Film Festival 45 years ago accompany him. The story.
—Three more. Cannes has unveiled new additions to the Official Selection for its upcoming 77th edition from May 14 to May 25. Three new films have been added to the Competition lineup: Oscar-winning director Michel Hazanavicius' animated feature The Most Precious of Cargoes, Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof's Seed of the Sacred Fig and Emanuel Parvu’s Three Miles to the End of the World. The story.
—Something new. Cannes has also unveiled the inaugural lineup for its Immersive Competition section, the first-ever selection of augmented and virtual reality works to screen at the austere French film fest. The 8 competition titles and 6 out-of-competition screenings include works featuring such talents as Jessica Chastain, Colin Farrell, Millie Bobby Brown, and Tahar Rahim. The lineup highlights cutting-edge VR and AR techniques and includes location-based virtual reality, mixed reality experiences, projection mapping, and holographic works. The story.
—Heading to Cannes. For its 2024 edition, the Cannes film market, the Marché du Film, will debut the Global Film Commission Network Summit together with the Association of Film Commissioners International. At the event, industry executives will discuss, among other things, “selecting locations for authentic storytelling, indigenous community engagement and dismantling location stereotypes,” the AFCI said. Attendees will include film commissioners, policymakers and production executives. The story. |
Janney and Bibb on Suffering Through Their '60s Looks in 'Palm Royale' ►"The world is changing, buckle up. And slowly, they do." For THR, Brande Victorian spoke to Allison Janney and Leslie Bibb about their Apple TV+ show Palm Royale. The pair draw parallels from the "cotton candy-wrapped" drama series about Palm Beach culture to the modern-day, and discuss working with their idols Kristen Wiig and Carol Burnett. The interview.
—"I was begging to be a part of this movie." THR's Brian Davids spoke to Eiza Gonzalez about her new film, The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. The busy actor, who is juggling multiple Guy Ritchie movies in the next few years, is also eagerly awaiting Netflix's decision on more 3 Body Problem, as well as word on a potential Ambulance sequel. The interview. |
Critics' Conversation: 'Civil War' and Civic Anxiety ►"People have always projected onto art, but there seems to be a renewed desperation for it to tell us how to be and what to do." Amid ongoing debate over whether Alex Garland’s latest film Civil War sufficiently spells out its stakes, THR critics David Rooney and Lovia Gyarkye ponder the burdens of political art during a particularly fraught election year. The conversation.
In other news...
—Deadpool & Wolverine trailer brings Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman together as frenemies
—J.A. Bayona’s Society of the Snow sweeps Platino Awards
—Kid Cudi breaks foot after jumping off Coachella stage
—Karlovy Vary Festival piles on angsty adaptations with Franz Kafka retrospective
—Chef Ludo Lefebvre brings beloved take on French cuisine to Cabo
—Dusty Kay, writer and producer on Entourage and Roseanne, dies at 69
—Lori and George Schappell, oldest living conjoined twins, die at 62
What else we're reading...
—Madeline Leung Coleman talks to screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes, who with tennis drama Challengers has become one of Hollywood's hottest scribes [Vulture]
—Carson Griffith profiles Cait Bailey, the publicist of several A-listers who is becoming something of a celeb herself [NYT]
—As rival luxury groups LVMH and Hermes streak off ahead, Angelina Rascouet and Tara Patel look at how Kering, overly reliant on Gucci, continues to struggle [Bloomberg]
—Jennifer Jacobs, Kurt Wagner, and Alex Barinka report that TikTok is set to remove a key executive responsible for convincing the U.S. government that the company was doing enough to stave off national security concerns [Bloomberg]
—Has Taylor Swift fatigue set in? With the deluge of material and coverage in recent times, Matt Stevens and Shivani Gonzalez report that some Swifties are starting to get frustrated [NYT]
Today...
...in 1999, Paramount unveiled Alexander Payne’s R-rated Reese Witherspoon high school comedy Election in limited theaters. The original review.
Today's birthdays: Dev Patel (34), John Cena (47), Jaime King (45), Judy Davis (69), Kal Penn (47), George Lopez (63), D.B. Weiss (53), John Oliver (47), Michael Moore (70), Gigi Hadid (29), Dan Frischman (65), Lee Majors (85), Sally Bretton (44), John Hannah (62), Valerie Bertinelli (64), Gemma Whelan (43), Melina Kanakaredes (57), Craig Sheffer (64), Jesse Lee Soffer (40), Rachel Skarsten (39), Molly Burnett (36), James Russo (71), Teagan Croft (20), Song Kang (30), Joyce DeWitt (75), Barry Watson (50), Manoj Bajpayee (55), Charlie Rowe (28), John Lutz (51), Eric Edelstein (47), Kjell Brutscheidt (28) |
| Michael Cuscuna, the three-time Grammy winner, Mosaic Records co-founder, historian and archivist who produced hundreds of jazz reissues and studio sessions during his career, has died. He was 75. The obituary. |
|
|
|
| | | |
