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HOLLYWOOD

Inside ‘A Small Light’: Modern Twists on a Period Drama

A candid conversation with the cast and crew behind National Geographic’s new WWII limited series.
The Editors • June 15, 2023
Julia Alexander • June 13, 2023
Zaz’s CNN Streaming Conundrum
For WBD C.E.O. David Zaslav, the future of CNN, as with many cable brands, comes down to three options.
Notes on the future of television news in an era of linear decline, streaming mega-platforms, and inevitable reinvention.
Jonathan Handel • June 12, 2023
Did the Directors Really Sabotage Their Sisters?
DGA Negotiations chair Jon Avnet.
A close look at the DGA’s proposed pact with the studios and streamers suggests a way forward, despite grumbling that leadership abandoned its fellow guilds.
Matthew Belloni • June 9, 2023
Zaz, Licht & The Media Hot Seat
David Zaslav and Warner Discovery have bigger problems than CNN, namely the worsening decline of the linear TV ecosystem. But Chris Licht’s trainwreck demise suggests that Zaz is still learning on the job, too.
YouTube C.E.O. Neal Mohan.
Julia Alexander • June 6, 2023
Is YouTube the Future of Streaming TV?
The least talked about video company is also the most popular, a veritable platform of platforms with billions of users, the one upon which all those other streamers rest.
Eriq Gardner • June 5, 2023
A Music Business Legal Coup
The song industry successfully lobbied the Trump administration to topple the judicial regime that determined its fees. Now comes the blowback.
Is the deal as “truly historic” as DGA negotiations committee chair Jon Avnet claims?
Jonathan Handel • June 5, 2023
Strike Politics: What the Directors Deal Means for Writers and Actors
The devil’s in the details as the DGA makes a quick (and probably not “historic”) three-year contract, the actors weigh a walkout and the writers strike presses on.
Mission 7, Tom Cruise’s nearly $300 million-budgeted baby, is getting bumped from IMAX screens.
Matthew Belloni • June 2, 2023
The Tom Cruise vs ‘Oppenheimer’ Movie Theater Smackdown
Cruise has been forcefully pushing exhibitors to put ‘Mission: Impossible’ ahead of Chris Nolan’s film on large-format screens after he lost three weeks of IMAX exclusivity in the first truly competitive summer for blockbusters since Covid.
Webtoon’s All of Us Are Dead is the fourth most watched international TV series of all time on Netflix.
Julia Alexander • May 30, 2023
Architect of a Korean Streaming Invasion
A candid conversation with JunKoo Kim, founder and C.E.O. of Webtoon, which has become an essential content discovery platform for Netflix and other global streamers.
WGA negotiating committee co-chair David Goodman.
Matthew Belloni • May 30, 2023
Must the Writers Strike Last Six Months? 
No, says negotiating committee co-chair David Goodman, who offers a path to resolution, responds to the Max credit debacle, and defends the guild’s hardliner tactics: “These companies are hurting.”
Billionaire investor Ron Burkle.
Matthew Belloni & Eriq Gardner • May 30, 2023
How Much Is ‘Yellowstone’ Worth?
An $80 million lawsuit brought by Ron Burkle against a Texas buyout shop has led to a counterattack, and questions around how Burkle got a piece of TV's biggest show.
Chris Keyser, co-chair of the WGA’s negotiating committee.
Matthew Belloni • May 26, 2023
Hollywood’s Writers-Strike Force Majeure Fantasy
The longer the work stoppage goes on, the more fears spread about studios cutting unproductive writer-producer deals, wiping the fiscal slate clean, and ushering in a new era of austerity. But how much of that will actually happen?
Julia Alexander • May 23, 2023
We Need to Talk About Netflix’s Ad Numbers
Netflix upended the industry once again last week with its first appearance at the upfronts, touting some strong numbers for its new ad tier. The streamer’s main argument coalesced around 5 million monthly active users, but… five million of what, exactly?
U.S. Supreme Court justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor.
Eriq Gardner • May 22, 2023
The Warhol Diaries: Kagan v. Sotomayor
Inside the titanic legal clash and Latinate trash-talk behind one of the most consequential cases to rock the art world, and Hollywood, in a generation.
Fran Drescher, president of SAG-AFTRA.
Jonathan Handel • May 22, 2023
Strike Update: Will the Actors Prompt a Tri-Guild Walk-Out?
News, notes, and fresh reporting on a multi-front evolving legal situation.
Disney C.F.O. Christine McCarthy and C.E.O. Bob Iger and have told everyone for months that the content purge was coming, part of their increasingly frantic effort to erase $3 billion from the bottom line this year.
Matthew Belloni • May 22, 2023
Disney and the Great Streaming Purge
What’s going on at Disney is kind of nuts. If you told me that each of the Seven Dwarfs holding up the executive building in Burbank were being auctioned off to increase free cash flow, I’d probably believe it. Nearly every division has been asked to spend less, some way less. And titles are disappearing from Disney+ and Hulu as an entire industry retrenches.
2015 Ted Sarandos would have cringed at the sight of 2023 Sarandos suggesting from the stage that Netflix host “a 30 minute commercial” that “plays out over several days.”
Matthew Belloni • May 19, 2023
The TV Upfronts B.S. Barometer
An honest assessment of the P.R. spin, wishful thinking and outright obfuscation in a slimmed-down, mostly star-free ad pitch week.
In 2019, Bob Iger was openly wary of introducing too much general entertainment to Disney+, concerned that it would harm the “family brand.”
Julia Alexander • May 16, 2023
The Iger-Hulu Flip-Flop
When Bob Iger first ushered Disney into the streaming era, he prioritized the company’s historic brand over growth at all costs. Well, now it’s time for growth at all costs.