Good morning,

Welcome back to The Backstory, your weekend digest of the very best of Puck.

It was another extraordinary week: Matt Belloni revealed his media C.E.O. pay gluttony index; Kim Masters took the temperature on Netflix’s theatrical reawakening; Eriq Gardner weighed the Blake Lively–Justin Baldoni endgame and previewed the N.I.L. private equity reckoning; Dylan Byers interrogated Byron Allen’s BuzzFeed rescue mission and the Times-Bibi dust-up; Bill Cohan ran the trillionaire math on Elon Musk; Ian Krietzberg parsed the White House’s sudden A.I. regulatory pivot; John Ourand probed FIFA’s World Cup press turbulence; Lauren Sherman unpacked fashion’s licensing-industrial complex; Rachel Strugatz charted Bobbi Brown’s second-act mic drop; Malique Morris evaluated Vinted’s American ambitions; and Marion Maneker reviewed the early sales of the New York spring auction gauntlet.

Meanwhile, down in D.C., Leigh Ann Caldwell trekked through Trump’s tariff fallout with Rep. Adrian Smith and decoded the D.C.C.C.’s anti-progressive gambit; Marianna Sotomayor investigated Hakeem Jeffries’ Dem cat-herding; and Peter Hamby spun the tale of Spencer Pratt’s ascent in the L.A. mayor’s race.

Check out these stories, and others, via the links below. And stick around for the backstory on how it all came together.

Lauren Sherman diagnoses fashion’s dependence on Jamie Salter’s ABG licensing kingdom and pressure-tests A.P.C.’s reinvention under L Catterton.
and…
Rachel Strugatz traces Bobbi Brown’s $200 million empire-building adventure at Jones Road.
meanwhile…
Malique Morris tests Vinted’s American resale ambitions.

Marion Maneker reviews the spring auction showdown and tours the New York fair week gallery rush.
and…
Ingrid Abramovitch drops in on Joris Laarman’s eco-futurist comeback.

Matt Belloni tallies the Hollywood C.E.O. gluttony index.
and…
Kim Masters digs into the Ted Sarandos rumor mill around Netflix’s theatrical thaw.
meanwhile…
Eriq Gardner sizes up the Lively–Baldoni post-settlement scoreboard.

Ian Krietzberg deciphers Elon Musk’s pivot from frontier models to becoming a compute landlord, and reads the tea leaves on the White House’s sudden A.I. preapproval flirtation.

Hilary Rose solves the Fergie dilemma.
and…
Paul Goldberger assesses Trump’s monument to himself.
meanwhile…
Michael Gross calculates the pied-à-terre tax.

Dylan Byers interrogates Byron Allen’s $20 million BuzzFeed gamble and drops a mic into the New York Times crying rooms.

John Ourand probes FIFA’s World Cup P.R. nightmare.
and…
Eriq previews the N.I.L. private equity reckoning.

Bill Cohan crunches the numbers on Elon’s paper trillionaire status and spotlights Wes Edens’ London restructuring workaround.

Peter Hamby profiles Spencer Pratt’s improbable L.A. mayoral surge.
and…
Leigh Ann Caldwell sits down for a conversation with Rep. Adrian Smith for our latest Puck Power Breakfast, presented by the American Chemistry Council.
meanwhile…
Marianna Sotomayor chronicles a House Democratic strategy sesh.

Dylan, John, and CNBC’s Alex Sherman break down the NFL rights standoff between legacy networks and streamers on The Grill Room.
and…
Ourand and investor Jason Stein predict the private equity industry’s next foray into sports on The Varsity.
and…
Lauren and Sophia Rivka Rossi philosophize about Hailey Bieber’s Alaïa moment and Ozempic in France on Fashion People.
and…
John Heilemann and CFR president Michael Froman trade notes on the Trump-Xi summit and the Ukraine pivot on Impolitic.
and…
Matt chats live with legendary writer-producer David E. Kelley about the craft of TV on The Town.
and…
Peter rings up Matt to handicap The Mandalorian and Grogu and Hollywood’s Cannes ghosting on The Powers That Be.

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Last week, my partner Marion Maneker briefly took some time away from his busy reporting schedule to cameo as a barista on Puck’s traveling Airstream, which rolled around Manhattan from TEFAF to Sotheby’s to Christie’s for the all-important May art sales. The art market, which Marion chronicles in his excellent newsletter, Wall Power (sign up here), is one of Puck’s most important domains. And this seemed like a fun and off-kilter way to tip our hat to the market and get in on the action.

Not only are we proud of the inroads we’ve made in the industry, but it also serves as a nexus for so many of our power corners. To wit: This year’s auction calendar is chockablock with collections ranging from the media-baron Newhouses to Robert Mnuchin, who originally made his coin in banking before becoming an important dealer. (His son, as you know, is Steve Mnuchin—a fellow Goldman alum who went on to dabble in the entertainment industry before becoming the Treasury secretary during Trump I.)

In many ways, the art world is also a proxy for various echelons of our economy. The market collapsed during Covid, roared in its easy-money aftermath, and then cooled again. But sales have been regaining strength in the middle of the market—and, as Marion has diligently noted, an unbridled enthusiasm has begun to take hold near the top. After all, Christie’s has $1.08 billion in presale estimates this season. Sotheby’s has about $665 million. “As a very seasoned collector told me outside TEFAF, the time to buy was last year, when confidence (and competition) were low,” Marion noted this week in his phenomenal piece, Sotheby’s $433 Million Pep Talk. “He said the market was overly pessimistic at the time—and, perhaps, a little too optimistic this season.”

Of course, timing market cycles is almost impossible. But that hasn’t stopped the houses from trying. Indeed, Marion’s brilliant accompanying piece, Seven Days in May, offers an even broader look into the economy through the prism of the art world, which may be best encapsulated by a bizarre micro-battle over a pair of Rothkos. As Marion put it, “Two major Rothkos on offer illustrate the dynamic between the two houses better than anything. Christie’s was the first to secure Agnes Gund’s consignment, a moody blue-and-green painting with a strong red stripe, estimated at a powerful $80 million. With fees it would be the most expensive Rothko sold at auction, and Christie’s was taking no chances with its presentation.”

He continued: “Over the weekend, an advisor shared with me a photograph of the wall where Christie’s had hung the painting—except the painting had been removed. In its place was only the effect of the lights that auction houses use to enhance artworks on view. Christie’s had gone the extra mile by adding a second light with more lumens to make the red stripe at the bottom of the art work positively vibrate off the canvas. For much of the past few months, there’s been talk in the market that Christie’s was having trouble finding a backer for the Gund Rothko at such a lofty price. Now, according to Christie’s website, it has. And the final price will almost certainly be affected by the sale of Mnuchin’s red Rothko at Sotheby’s, which may appeal to a broader range of plutocrats at a lower price point of $70 million. If the Mnuchin work sparks a bidding war, it could easily reprice the Gund Rothko.”

And finally: “Christie’s may worry that the Sotheby’s sale will deprive it of one bidder for a major Rothko and thereby diminish the chances of a pitched battle. (You would be naive to imagine that the Mnuchin Rothko is preceding the Gund Rothko to the auction block by happenstance…) But two determined bidders are all it takes to launch such a battle. And if two buyers go at the first Rothko with hammer and tongs, driving it to a price in the nine-figure range, the received wisdom is that more bidders would be pulled in for the Gund Rothko the following week.”

In the end, the first Rothko had a hammer price of $74 million, which netted out to about $86 million with fees. This price is going to reverberate next week and through the rest of the buying season—an indication of the quantums of dry powder that exist in our economy, unworried about war in Iran or domestic gas prices. (You don’t always need to roll around in an Airstream to gauge such sentiment, but it helps…) It’s a unique insight into how the upper echelons of our economy really operate, and the sort of delightful observation that you can only devour at Puck.

Have a great weekend,

Jon

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